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Overview

OneCLI injects your OpenAI credentials into requests to api.openai.com automatically. Agents make standard HTTP requests to the OpenAI API; the gateway adds the Authorization: Bearer header before forwarding. This lets agents use GPT models, DALL-E, embeddings, and other OpenAI services without ever seeing or handling your credentials directly. For a comparison of supported LLM providers, see LLM Providers.

Auth methods

OneCLI supports two ways to authenticate with OpenAI:

Setup: API Key

Use this method if you have an OpenAI API key with pay-per-use billing.
1

Get your API key

Go to platform.openai.com/api-keys and create a new secret key. Copy it — you won’t be able to see it again.
2

Add the key in OneCLI

Open the OneCLI dashboard, navigate to Connections > LLMs, and click Add LLM Key. Select OpenAI, make sure the API Key tab is selected, and paste your key.
CLI alternative:

Setup: Codex (OAuth)

Use this method to route requests through your ChatGPT subscription instead of paying per API call. This uses the same OAuth credentials that OpenAI Codex CLI uses.
1

Install Codex CLI

2

Authenticate with device auth

Follow the prompts to sign in with your ChatGPT account. Once authenticated, Codex saves your credentials to ~/.codex/auth.json.
3

Add the credentials in OneCLI

Open the OneCLI dashboard, navigate to Connections > LLMs, and click Add LLM Key. Select OpenAI, switch to the Codex (OAuth) tab, and upload your ~/.codex/auth.json file.
CLI alternative:
The gateway automatically refreshes the access token when it expires using the stored refresh token — no manual re-authentication needed.

How it works

  1. Your credentials are encrypted and stored by OneCLI (AES-256-GCM at rest)
  2. When an agent sends a request to api.openai.com, the gateway intercepts it
  3. The gateway injects an Authorization: Bearer {token} header
  4. The request is forwarded to OpenAI
For Codex OAuth, the gateway also monitors token expiry. When the access token expires, it automatically uses the refresh token to obtain a new one and persists the updated credentials — agents experience no interruption. Agents never see the raw credentials. If you rotate your key or re-authenticate with Codex, update it in the dashboard and all agents pick up the new credentials automatically.

Controlling access

Access is per agent: attach the key to each agent that needs it — an agent without the grant can’t use it at all. Organization rules add guardrails on top: rate-limit requests, restrict agents to specific models by blocking certain paths, or flag high-cost operations for manual approval. Everything is checked before credential injection, so a blocked request never reaches OpenAI.