Authentication

The local API at http://localhost:11434 does not require authentication.

To use cloud models, publish models, or download private models, sign in to Ollama. For direct API access to ollama.com, use an API key.

API keys

Direct cloud inference at https://ollama.com/api and https://ollama.com/v1 requires an API key. No Ollama installation or local server is required.

Create an API key, then set it in your terminal:

export OLLAMA_API_KEY="your_api_key"

Use the API key in the Authorization: Bearer header. This also applies to the hosted Anthropic-compatible /v1/messages endpoint; x-api-key alone is not supported.

curl https://ollama.com/api/chat \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $OLLAMA_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "model": "gemma4:31b",
    "messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "Why is the sky blue?"}],
    "stream": false
  }'

API keys do not expire. Revoke a key in API keys settings.

Keep keys outside browser code and source control. See the API quickstart for shell setup and compatibility examples.

Signing in

Sign in from your terminal:

ollama signin

Ollama then authenticates cloud requests for you:

ollama run gpt-oss:120b-cloud

This also works through the local API:

curl http://localhost:11434/api/generate -d '{
  "model": "gpt-oss:120b-cloud",
  "prompt": "Why is the sky blue?"
}'