Claude Code

Run Claude Code on Hephaestus and pay in Naira.

Claude Code reads its endpoint and credentials from environment variables, so pointing it at Hephaestus is four lines.

Option A: shell profile

export ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL="https://api.gethephaestus.com"
export ANTHROPIC_AUTH_TOKEN="hph_live_YOUR_KEY"

# Pick the models Claude Code should use
export ANTHROPIC_MODEL="claude-sonnet-5-5"
export ANTHROPIC_DEFAULT_OPUS_MODEL="claude-opus-5-5"
export ANTHROPIC_DEFAULT_SONNET_MODEL="claude-sonnet-5-5"
export ANTHROPIC_DEFAULT_HAIKU_MODEL="claude-haiku-5-5"

Open a new terminal and run claude.

Option B: Claude Code settings file

Put the same values in ~/.claude/settings.json so they apply everywhere without touching your shell:

{
  "env": {
    "ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL": "https://api.gethephaestus.com",
    "ANTHROPIC_AUTH_TOKEN": "hph_live_YOUR_KEY",
    "ANTHROPIC_MODEL": "claude-sonnet-5-5",
    "ANTHROPIC_DEFAULT_HAIKU_MODEL": "claude-haiku-5-5"
  }
}

Keeping costs sensible

• Prompt caching is on automatically in Claude Code, and cached input is billed at a fraction of normal input. That is why long sessions cost less than the raw token counts suggest. Check Usage to see the split.
• Use Sonnet for day-to-day work and switch to Opus only for hard problems (/model).
• Set a spending cap on the key you give Claude Code, for example ₦20,000, so an overnight loop can't surprise you.
• Claude Code's web search is billed at $0.01 per search on top of tokens, converted to Naira at your rate.

If it doesn't work

• “Invalid API key”: you're still logged in to Claude.ai (run /logout), or the key was copied with a space.
• 402 errors: your balance is empty or the key hit its cap. Top up or raise the cap.
• “Model not available”: use one of the IDs on the models page.