403 PERMISSION_DENIED – Gemini API project is Restricted

Gemini API
1

Subject:
403 PERMISSION_DENIED – Gemini API project is Restricted

Hello Google Gemini API Team,

I am experiencing an access restriction on my Gemini API project.

Google AI Studio currently shows:

Billing Tier: Unavailable
Status: Restricted

Every Gemini API request returns:

403 PERMISSION_DENIED
“Your project has been denied access. Please contact support.”

I have completed phone verification and 2-Step Verification.

I am trying to use the Gemini API for a small personal/student development project. I only need the Free Tier and do not want to enable paid billing.

Could you please manually review the project and restore Free Tier API access if this restriction is a false positive?

Thank you.

2

Hello @Chill_Exstacy ,

Getting a 403 API error response and / or seeing “Unavailable” next to your project in AI audio indicates a flag has been placed on your account. To proceed:

If you’re on the free tier with no billing attached, please try the below steps:

  1. Check Model Availability & Rate Limits:

    • Ensure that the model you are requesting is available on your current plan. For example, not all models are available on the free tier. You can verify model availability, quotas, and limits on the AI Studio Rate Limit dashboard.

  2. Ensure you have completed age verification by navigating to Google Account Age Verification and verifying date of birth in Google Account Personal Info.

  3. Complete Phone Verification and turn on 2-Step Verification (2SV) on the Google Account associated with your project.

  4. Once age, phone and 2sv are configured, retry your request or create a new API key in Google AI Studio.

  5. If completing these steps still does not restore access (or if using a model requiring a paid tier), you might want to consider adding prepayment credits directly in Google AI Studio and/ or attaching a Google Cloud Billing account in the Google Cloud Console. Please note this will mean you lose your free tier quota.