Claude Desktop supports pointing to external gateways via Developer Mode. After enabling, configure cheapkeyai.com as a Custom Gateway so all chats in the app route through cheapkeyai.com's endpoint and API key.
Enable Developer Mode
- Open Claude Desktop.
- Go to Help → Troubleshooting.
- Select Enable Developer Mode.
- Restart the app if prompted by Claude Desktop.
Add Custom Gateway
- Go to Developer → Configure Third-Party Inference.
- Open the Connection tab.
- Select connection type: Gateway.
Connection Info
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Credential kind | Static API key |
| Gateway base URL | https://cheapkeyai.com |
| Gateway API key | sk-your-api-key-here |
| Auth scheme | x-api-key |
Enable Model discovery
Go to the Models tab, enable Model discovery to let Claude Desktop automatically retrieve the model list. Use the `claude-...` models active on cheapkeyai.com.
claude-opus-4-8
claude-sonnet-5
claude-haiku-4-5