Why there's a meter
Some Superpowers cost real money to run, including AI calls and real-time data activity. The Hive Usage meter is how Teacher Hive keeps these sustainable, and it's how you stay in control of your own usage. Builder and Pro accounts come with a monthly allowance. The Hive Meter on My Settings page shows what you've used and what's left, and a buggy app or sudden surge can never silently rack up cost.
You'll get warnings when you've used the majority of your usage limit, and Superpowers pause at 100% until the meter resets at the start of the next month. Most teachers never come close to the cap.
What counts
- AI Superpower calls. Each text or image generation counts as one interaction, no matter which provider or model.
- Connected Superpower reads. Each guest data fetch (live leaderboard, poll results, shared whiteboard sync) counts as 1.
- Connected Super writes. Each data save from guests or you counts as 1.
- Connected App uploads. Each guest upload (photo, audio, file) counts as 25, since uploads are heavier on storage and bandwidth than a regular write.
What doesn't count
- App launches. Visits to your apps are free, regardless of how many student/visitors open them.
- Short Link Superpower. Creating and resolving short links don't touch the meter.
- File Locker uploads. File Locker has it's own cap (50 MB for Builder, 2 GB for Pro), and do not fill the Hive Usage meter.
- Emails. The Email Superpower has its own cap and doesn't add to Hive Usage.
- Bookmarks, follows, comments, profile views, search. None of the social or browse activity counts.
Monthly cap by tier
- Hive Builder, 25,000 interactions per month.
- Hive Pro, 1,000,000 interactions per month.
Caps reset on the 1st of each month. Your meter, plus a per-app breakdown of where your interactions came from, lives in My Settings → Hive Usage.
Reducing usage
The way an app is coded affects how much Hive Usage it spends. Two apps that look the same to students can use very different amounts behind the scenes. Most of this is automatic if your chatbot uses Teacher Hive's standard patterns. But there are a few things worth asking for explicitly.
Things to ask your chatbot for
- "Load only this week's data, with a Show More button for older." Submission lists that load every entry forever get heavier every month.
Things you can do at the app level
- Only turn on Superpowers you actually use. If your app doesn't use AI, leave AI off in the App form. The toggle is the easiest usage control there is.
Things you can do without touching code
- Watch the per-app breakdown in My Settings → Hive Usage. One or two apps usually account for most of the activity. That's where to focus your attention if your meter is climbing.
- Pause apps you're done with. An app that's still live can keep drawing visits months after you've moved on. Pausing stops the meter for that app.
- Mark class-only apps as Unlisted. Turn off Public Listing in the Edit App form. The app stays available by direct link for your class but won't be surfaced in search, on your profile, or in collections — reducing unexpected traffic.
- Close apps with the Connected Superpower tabs when you're not actively using them. A Connected Superpowered app left open in a tab keeps polling for live updates and burning reads in the background. Closing the tab stops the activity.
- Tell your students "click Submit once." Eager students who click an AI button repeatedly can rack up calls fast. A one-sentence classroom rule helps.
- If one app stands out as the heavy user, decide: is it pulling its weight for what it costs you? If not, retire it, simplify it, or ask your chatbot to rebuild a leaner version.
If you hit 100%
When you reach the cap, AI and Connected Superpower actions on your apps pause until the next month. Guests opening your apps will see a friendly "this is taking a break" message. Your apps are not deleted, your data is not affected, and everything reactivates the moment the new month begins.
Need more usage?
If you have a legitimate one-off (a viral app, a district-wide PD, a school event), email hello@teacherhive.app and we can extend your quota for the month. Upgrading to Hive Pro increases the cap 40x.
