> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.dakota.xyz/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
# x402 Payments
> Let a payment agent pay for metered APIs over HTTP 402, under a budget your customer sets, without ever holding a key
[x402](https://www.x402.org) is a protocol for paying for an HTTP request inside the request itself. A seller answers an unpaid request with `402 Payment Required` and machine-readable payment terms. The buyer signs a payment authorization and retries with it attached, and the seller's *facilitator* settles it on-chain.
With Dakota, a hosted [payment agent](/documentation/agentic-payments) pays those 402s from a Dakota-custodied wallet. Your application forwards the seller's terms, Dakota checks them against a budget your customer set and returns the signed payment header, and your application sends it to the seller. Nobody on your side holds a key.
**Beta.** x402 is in early access. Run it against the [sandbox](/documentation/testing) on Base Sepolia first.
## How it differs from the rest of Agentic Payments
The rest of Agentic Payments schedules payments to payees your customer named in advance. x402 turns that model around:
| | Scheduled payments | x402 |
| -------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Who is paid** | Named recipients, fixed when the mandate is signed | Whoever the seller's 402 names, discovered at request time |
| **What the customer authorizes** | A [mandate](/documentation/agentic-payments/mandate-signing) with per-payee caps | An [x402 mandate](/documentation/agentic-payments/x402/budgets-and-holds): a **budget** across every seller |
| **What Dakota produces** | A transaction, sent when the payment fires | A signed authorization; the seller's facilitator submits it |
| **Typical size** | Bills and payouts | Fractions of a cent to a few dollars, many times a day |
| **Wallet** | The customer's wallets | One dedicated [x402 wallet](#the-x402-wallet) per agent |
## The flow
```mermaid theme={null}
sequenceDiagram
participant App as Your application
participant Seller as Seller API
participant Dakota as Dakota
participant Fac as Seller's facilitator
participant Chain as Base
App->>Seller: GET /resource
Seller-->>App: 402 Payment Required + payment terms
App->>Dakota: POST /payment-agents/{id}/x402/signatures (the terms)
Note over Dakota: Check the x402 mandate,
record a hold, then sign
Dakota-->>App: payment header (or 403 naming the limit)
App->>Seller: GET /resource + payment header
Seller->>Fac: verify and settle
Fac->>Chain: transferWithAuthorization
Seller-->>App: 200 + the resource
Note over Dakota,Chain: Dakota reads the chain and marks the hold settled
```
The signature Dakota returns is an [EIP-3009](https://eips.ethereum.org/EIPS/eip-3009) `TransferWithAuthorization`: signed typed data, not a transaction. It costs the payer no gas, and the whole payment completes inside one HTTP round trip.
## Issuing a signature is spending money
Nothing downstream asks for approval. Whoever holds the signed authorization can settle it until it expires. That is why the [x402 mandate](/documentation/agentic-payments/x402/budgets-and-holds) is the control that matters, and why Dakota evaluates it and records a **hold** against the budget *before* any signature exists. A payment the mandate refuses is never signed.
It is also why x402 spend never appears as a wallet transaction: the seller's facilitator moves the money, not Dakota. The **holds** are the record of x402 spend. See [budgets & holds](/documentation/agentic-payments/x402/budgets-and-holds#holds).
## The x402 wallet
Each agent pays x402 from exactly one wallet, created when you [enable x402](/documentation/agentic-payments/x402/quickstart#1-enable-x402-on-the-agent) for the agent:
* **It can sign x402 payments and nothing else.** Any attempt to send funds from it is refused. That keeps it a plain account, the kind every x402 facilitator accepts.
* **It is funded by transfer.** Send USDC to its address on the network the agent pays on.
* **It is separate from the agent's other wallets.** It does not appear in the agent's `wallet_ids`, and no x402 request takes a wallet id: the agent's x402 wallet is the only one it pays x402 from.
## Objects
| Object | What it is | Lifecycle |
| ---------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------- |
| **x402 wallet** | The agent's sign-only paying wallet. One per agent. | `provisioning` → `active` |
| **x402 mandate** | The budget: a per-call ceiling, a rolling aggregate across all sellers, an optional call cap, and a payee policy. | valid from creation until `valid_until` |
| **Hold** | One issued authorization and the budget it commits. | `outstanding` → `settled` or `released` |
## What's supported
| | |
| -------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Asset | **USDC only**. Terms in any other token are refused with a `403` naming the supported set. |
| Networks | Base (`base` / `eip155:8453`) and Base Sepolia (`base-sepolia` / `eip155:84532`) |
| Protocol | x402 **v1** and **v2**; the seller's 402 decides which. See [the quickstart](/documentation/agentic-payments/x402/quickstart#4-pay-the-402). |
| Scheme | `exact` |
| Agents | Hosted payment agents that are `active` |
## Next
Enable x402, fund the wallet, set a budget, and pay a 402.
Every mandate field, the payee policies, and how holds settle.