Credits are consumed when processing rows of data in live runs of Parabola flows. Understanding how credits work can help you optimize your flows and manage your usage effectively.
Credits Overview
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Steps, visualizations, and artifacts all use credits. Cards that document your flow process do not.
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Credits are used each time you run a flow. This happens when you manually click the Run Flow button, or when a webhook, schedule, or inbound email trigger the flow.
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Credits are not used while you build a flow, when you’re making edits, or when in a draft flow.
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Credits are only used by steps that have input and output data. For example, if you filter to zero rows and then your flow has additional steps, your filter rows step will be the last one that uses credits for that given flow run.
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Credit usage is determined based on the complexity of the tasks being completed:
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For steps generated by Prowork, Parabola uses a calculation based on the number of input data sources and a measurement called Dimensions. Dimensions are the different types of work completed by a step, and include editing columns, adding columns, adding rows, and removing rows. The base cost of a Prowork step is 20 credits and, based on complexity, can range up to a maximum of 80.
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Non-Prowork steps can perform a much smaller set of tasks, and use credits at a flat rate of 10 per step, regardless of row count.
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AI steps (such as Parabola’s PDF parser) use variable credits on the basis of prompt complexity and data size.
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A small subset of steps use credits on a per-row basis. These are the Send Emails by Row, PDF Generation, and Address Parsing steps.
When Credits Are Consumed
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Credits are only consumed by steps that successfully process rows of data
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Disconnected or error-producing steps do not consume credits
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Each processed row counts towards credit consumption
Monitoring Credit Usage
You can track your credit consumption by visiting the Billing page. This page shows your current credit balance and usage history.
The billing page only shows total credit usage across your team for the entire billing period. This counter on the billing page updates in real-time, so if you record the number of credits before and after running a flow, you should be able to estimate the number of credits it took to run the flow.
For a breakdown of Per Flow and Per User reporting, Admins can use the Usage Reporting & Analytics dashboard.
Optimizing Credit Usage
To minimize credit consumption in your flows:
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Filter out unnecessary rows early in your flow
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Remove or disconnect steps that aren’t needed for your final output
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Consider using filtering or limiting steps at the beginning of your flow to reduce the number of rows being processed
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Be mindful of frequency, unnecessary or repetitive flow runs can result in excess credit usage
The earlier you filter out unnecessary data in your flow, the fewer credits you’ll consume in some subsequent steps.
