Request for Free Tier access review — Gemini API 403 PERMISSION_DENIED / Project Restricted

Gemini API
1

Hello Gemini API / Google AI Studio Team,

I am requesting a manual review of my Gemini API project access.

My Google AI Studio project currently shows:
Billing Tier: Unavailable
Status: Restricted

When I call the Gemini API, I receive:

403 PERMISSION_DENIED — “Your project has been denied access, please contact support.”

I have tested my API connection from Python. The API key is loaded successfully, but the generateContent request is rejected with the project-level 403 error.

I am developing a low-volume academic college project called “AI Career Guide & Resume Analyzer” for learning, development, testing, and demonstration.

I would like to use the Gemini API Free Tier and do not want to enable paid billing or purchase prepaid credits.

Could you please review my project/account and restore Gemini API Free Tier access if I am eligible?

I have not included my API key, password, or other private credentials.

Thank you.

2

Hello @PALIVELA_SWEETI_236N ,

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. Once age verification is configured, retry your request or create a new API key in Google AI Studio.

  4. 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.