Choose a plan by domain capacity
A POM AI plan grants two separate things: a number of domains it may authorize, and a quantity of credits per period. They are independent, and choosing a plan means checking both.
Two limits, not one
| Limit | What it constrains | What happens when reached |
|---|---|---|
| Domain capacity | How many hosts may be authorized at once | New activations are refused |
| Credit allowance | How much generation work per period | Operations are refused until credits are added or renewed |
A plan can be right on one axis and wrong on the other. An agency with ten small sites needs domain capacity more than credits. A single high-volume publisher needs credits more than domains.
Counting domains honestly
Every host counts as one slot, including the ones people forget. www and non-www count as one; a subdomain, a staging copy and each multisite subsite that uses AI each count separately. A retired site holds its slot until the domain is deactivated.
The counting rules are set out in Understand domain authorization limits. Count from that page, not from the number of clients you have.
Sizing the credit allowance
Do not estimate. Measure.
- Run one full billing period doing normal work.
- Read the total consumed from the usage log in My Account → POM AI Management.
- Add the growth you genuinely expect.
A plan sized this way is usually smaller than an intuitive guess. Remember that unused subscription credits do not roll over, so over-sizing wastes the surplus every period. Under-sizing is corrected with a top-up when needed. For uneven workloads, the smaller plan plus occasional top-ups is normally the better shape. See Subscription credits and Top-up credits.
The shared-pool problem
All authorized domains draw on one balance. There is no per-site allocation, so a single site running a large batch can consume what the others expected to use.
Two mitigations:
Per-domain spending limits. In My Account → POM AI Management, the Manage AI Domains card lets you attach an optional limit to each domain. Set it from real consumption data rather than guessing — the usage log tells you what each site normally uses.
Separate subscriptions. When sites belong to different customers, give each its own subscription and its own key. Then usage, billing and limits are naturally separated, and a client's workload cannot affect yours.
Deciding between the two models
| Situation | Model |
|---|---|
| Your own portfolio of sites, one budget | One subscription, several authorized domains, per-domain limits |
| Client sites, each paying for their own AI | One subscription per client, each saving their own key |
| A multisite network you own entirely | One subscription, each subsite authorized, per-domain limits |
| A multisite network hosting third-party subsites | Each subsite owner subscribes; the network key stays for updates |
The multisite cases are covered in Configure POM AI on WordPress multisite.
When you outgrow a plan
Two symptoms, two different remedies:
- Activations refused — you need more domain capacity. Free a slot by deactivating a retired domain, or move up a plan. See Remove an authorized domain.
- Operations refused for credits — you need more allowance. A top-up covers the current period; a larger plan fixes it structurally. If you top up most periods, the plan is too small.
Buying a second subscription is a legitimate third option: when an account holds more than one active POM AI license, adding a domain uses the first license with capacity remaining, so the totals genuinely combine.
A short review to run each period
- How many domains are authorized, and are they all still live?
- How many credits were consumed, and by which domain?
- Did any domain hit its spending limit?
- Was a top-up needed, and was that the second period in a row?
Two consecutive top-ups is the signal to resize. See Single, Agency and Unlimited.