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Agent Budget

Reviewed 19 July 2026Canonical definitionPart of: AI Agent Cost & Token Terms →

An agent budget is the predefined allocation of compute, tokens, API calls, or financial spend granted to an AI agent for a task or time period. Budgets function as a hard governance control, when an agent reaches its limit, execution stops, escalates, or requires reauthorisation rather than continuing unchecked.

§01 / QUESTIONSterm: Agent Budget
Questions

Common questions.

What is Agent Budget?

An agent budget is the predefined allocation of compute, tokens, API calls, or financial spend granted to an AI agent for a task or time period.

How does Agent Budget work?

Budgets function as a hard governance control, when an agent reaches its limit, execution stops, escalates, or requires reauthorisation rather than continuing unchecked.

Which terms are related to Agent Budget?

Closely related concepts include Token Budget, Agent Spend Controls, Inference Cost, Agent Quota. Each is defined in the Prefactor glossary.

§02 / RELATEDnext: where this fits
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