# Why ATLAS

ATLAS is an AI gateway and monitoring platform. It sits between your applications and your AI providers. Every request is authenticated, attributed, capped and recorded in one place.

## The problem it solves

Each team signs up with its own AI provider. Keys end up in shared chats and scripts, the invoice arrives a month later, and nobody can say which project spent what. ATLAS gives your organisation:

- **One endpoint** for every provider. Your applications keep using OpenAI- or Anthropic-compatible SDKs and tools.
- **Ownership.** Every key belongs to a person or a project, so every request has an owner.
- **Limits before the bill.** ATLAS checks budgets before a request reaches the provider, not afterwards.
- **A single record** of who called which model, and what it cost.

For example, a team shares one OpenAI key today. With ATLAS, each developer gets a personal key tied to the team's budget, and the pipeline gets a project key. Spend then rolls up by team and project.

## How spend is counted

ATLAS prices each request once, in euros, at the moment it happens. That price never changes afterwards, so later price or exchange-rate changes don't rewrite your history. Budgets and dashboards add up the same totals, so the figure you see is the figure that blocks a request. For more information, see [Budget and cost](https://docs.atlas.ilionx.dev/concepts/budget-and-cost.md).

## Data and privacy

Every request leaves a metadata record: who called, which model, status, tokens, cost and timing. ATLAS stores prompt and response text only when you switch on capture for a provider. Capture is off by default. For more information, see [Usage and audit](https://docs.atlas.ilionx.dev/concepts/usage-and-audit.md#data-and-privacy).

## Supported providers

ATLAS connects to these providers:

- OpenAI and any OpenAI-compatible service, such as vLLM, Mistral, Groq, DeepSeek and OpenRouter
- Azure OpenAI and Azure AI Foundry
- Anthropic
- Ollama
- Amazon Bedrock

For more information, see [Providers and models](https://docs.atlas.ilionx.dev/concepts/providers-and-models.md).

## A hosted service

ilionx runs ATLAS for you, so there is nothing to install. ilionx sets up your organisation. You manage people, spaces, providers, keys and budgets in the web app.

## Security

- **Single sign-on.** Your organisation connects its own identity provider, and people can be provisioned automatically. For more information, see [Identity and access](https://docs.atlas.ilionx.dev/concepts/identity-and-access.md).
- **Access checked on every request.** ATLAS reads memberships each time. Role changes made in ATLAS apply on the person's next request. Roles from your identity provider apply at the next sign-in.
- **Tenant isolation.** Your data belongs to your organisation alone. Another organisation can't see it, or even tell that it exists.
- **Encrypted secrets.** ATLAS stores provider credentials and API keys encrypted.
- **Immutable audit trail.** Audit records are never rewritten, even after users, projects or spaces are deleted.

## Where to go next

- New to the product? Start with the [quickstart](https://docs.atlas.ilionx.dev/getting-started/quickstart.md).
- Setting up for your team? Follow [Set up your first organisation](https://docs.atlas.ilionx.dev/getting-started/first-organisation.md).
- Want the structure? Read [Organisations](https://docs.atlas.ilionx.dev/concepts/organisations.md), then [Spaces](https://docs.atlas.ilionx.dev/concepts/spaces.md) and [Projects](https://docs.atlas.ilionx.dev/concepts/projects.md).