How your usage is billed in Flat Embed?

Our Embed Pro plan operates on a usage-based billing model. Charges are determined by the number of unique monthly users who access the Flat Embed on your website. For detailed information on our pricing structure, visit our pricing page. If you’re an existing Embed subscriber, you can monitor your usage on the Embed billing page.

Legacy Plans: For those subscribed to Legacy embed plans prior to 2024, billing is twofold. Viewer traffic is billed based on the total page views, while editor traffic is calculated according to the number of users.

In the following sections, we will explore how unique user interactions with your embed are counted, and provide guidance on configuring your embed to accurately track usage.

Recommended Approach: Utilizing a Unique User Identifier

For precise billing based on your traffic, we recommend providing an opaque user identifier (userId) each time the embed is loaded.

Consider a practical example: Suppose “Pierre” is a user in your database with the unique identifier 42. Each time Pierre accesses a page on your website that contains an embed, you should pass this userId within the embed URLs.

When incorporating <iframe> codes directly into your web pages, you can dynamically insert the userId into the embed URL as a query string. For instance, if your application ID (appId) is 123 and you wish to load the score abc, the corresponding embed URL for Pierre (with the user identifier 42) would be:

https://flat-embed.com/abc?appId=123&userId=42

If you’re using our Embed SDK, the userId can be specified as embedParams.userId. For example, with appId 123, the score abc, and user identifier 42, you would set it up as follows:

import Embed from 'flat-embed';

const container = document.getElementById('embed-container');
const embed = new Embed(container, {
  score: 'abc',
  embedParams: {
    appId: '123',
    userId: '42',
  },
});

Monthly Billing: At the end of each subscription month, we tally all the unique userId values that have accessed your embeds and bill you accordingly.

Privacy Note: When assigning a userId, ensure it’s an opaque identifier that does not contain personal data (such as email addresses). Ideally, it should be a non-descriptive ID from your database, like 42. For additional security, we hash these user identifiers using SHA1 internally, further safeguarding any personal information.

Should you require assistance in setting up userId for your website or application, please do not hesitate to contact us. We’re here to help.

Default Method: IP addresses

By default, we use the IP addresses of your end-users to calculate the usage of your embeds unless you opt for the userId method described earlier.

Monthly Billing: At the conclusion of each subscription month, we’ll tally the distinct IP addresses that have accessed your embeds and base your charges on these figures.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Which Method Should I Choose?

For more precise billing and enhanced analytics on your account, we recommend implementing opaque user identifiers (userId). It’s important to note that individuals often access services from different networks within a single month, leading to the same user being counted multiple times if tracked solely by IP address.

Why Don’t Flat Embeds Rely on Cookies?

Privacy Considerations: Most web browsers typically block cookies in iframes for privacy reasons.
Device Variability: Users accessing services through multiple devices would be inaccurately counted as separate users, similar to the IP address method.

How Can I Review My Past Embed Usage?

You can examine the analytics of your application in your Flat Embed account and view your upcoming invoice on the billing page. For any inquiries, please feel free to reach out to our team.