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❗️ Currently free on the dev network, so no need to deposit funds. More details coming soon for test and production networks.
💰 Need Test Tokens? Visit the Chronicle Yellowstone Faucet to get test tokens for your EOA account.
See SDK Reference for more details on the Payment Manager. Payment Manager Reference

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Overview

The Payment Manager demonstrates Lit Protocol’s payment system - a billing system for decentralised cryptographic services. Users pay for compute resources on the Lit network to access core services like:
  • Encryption/Decryption - Secure data with programmable access control
  • PKP Signing - Cryptographic keys that can sign transactions based on conditions
  • Lit Actions - Serverless functions with cryptographic capabilities
Similar to how you pay AWS for cloud computing, this\system ensures the decentralised network can sustain itself and pay node operators. You can deposit funds, request withdrawals with security delays, and manage balances for yourself or other users (enabling applications to sponsor their users’ costs for better UX).
1

Payment Manager Setup

import { createLitClient } from '@lit-protocol/lit-client';
import { nagaTest } from '@lit-protocol/networks';

// 1. Create lit client
const litClient = await createLitClient({ network: nagaTest });

// 2. Get PaymentManager instance (requires account for transactions)
const paymentManager = await litClient.getPaymentManager({
account: yourAccount // viem account instance
});
2

Create an account

// 1. import the useWalletClient function from wagmi
import { useWalletClient } from 'wagmi';

// 2. Use your connected wallet as the account
const { data: myAccount } = useWalletClient();
3

Deposit funds

// 1. Deposit funds to your own account
const result = await paymentManager.deposit({
  amountInEth: "0.1",
});

console.log(`Deposit successful: ${result.hash}`);
// Returns: { hash: string, receipt: object }

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Auth Service API Endpoints

Leverage the hosted Auth Service to manage delegation without exposing private keys in your application:
  • POST /register-payer - Send your x-api-key header to receive a delegated payer address and payerSecretKey. Persist this secret securely; it is required for all future delegation calls.
  • POST /add-users - Provide headers x-api-key and payer-secret-key plus a JSON body containing an array of user addresses. The Auth Service uses the Payment Manager internally to delegate payments to each address in a single transaction.
The legacy capacity-credit minting flow has been removed. Payment delegation now interacts directly with the Payment Manager contracts. 
import { createLitClient } from '@lit-protocol/lit-client';
import { nagaTest } from '@lit-protocol/networks';

// 1. Create the Lit client for the naga-test environment
const litClient = await createLitClient({ network: nagaTest });

const authServiceBaseUrl = 'https://naga-test-auth-service.example.com';
const apiKey = process.env.LIT_API_KEY!;

// 3. Register a payer wallet (store the secret securely server-side)
const registerResponse = await litClient.authService.registerPayer({
authServiceBaseUrl,
apiKey,
});

console.log('Payer wallet:', registerResponse.payerWalletAddress);
console.log('Payer secret (store securely!):', registerResponse.payerSecretKey);

// 4. Later on, delegate payments for multiple users using the saved secret
const delegateResponse = await litClient.authService.delegateUsers({
authServiceBaseUrl,
apiKey,
payerSecretKey: registerResponse.payerSecretKey,
userAddresses: [
  '0x1234...abcd',
  '0xabcd...1234',
],
});

console.log('Delegation submitted with tx hash:', delegateResponse.txHash);

// 5. Continue to use the same payer secret for future delegation calls

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How the Auth Service derives payer wallets

  • The service holds a single root mnemonic (LIT_DELEGATION_ROOT_MNEMONIC).
  • /register-payer combines the x-api-key header with a freshly generated payerSecretKey. That pair is hashed into a deterministic derivation index, which is then used with the root mnemonic to derive a unique child wallet.
  • The response includes the derived wallet address and the random payerSecretKey. The server does not store this secret; you must persist it securely on the client side.
  • Later, /add-users expects both headers (x-api-key and payer-secret-key). The service recomputes the same derivation index and wallet on the fly, so the same header pair always maps to the same child wallet.
  • Calling /register-payer again with the same API key issues a new random payerSecretKey, which leads to a different child wallet. Choose whether to rotate secrets or keep the original one depending on your application needs.
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