{"meta":{"title":"How GitHub billing works","intro":"Learn what you'll be charged for, when charges occur, and how to track your usage on GitHub to avoid billing surprises.","product":"Billing and payments","breadcrumbs":[{"href":"/en/billing","title":"Billing and payments"},{"href":"/en/billing/get-started","title":"Get started"},{"href":"/en/billing/get-started/how-billing-works","title":"How billing works"}],"documentType":"article"},"body":"# How GitHub billing works\n\nLearn what you'll be charged for, when charges occur, and how to track your usage on GitHub to avoid billing surprises.\n\n<!--\nAudience: All users\nJTBD: When I decide I want to pay for increased access, I need to understand what and how GitHub will charge me, so that I feel confident that I have been billed correctly and don't get any surprises. -->\n\n## What GitHub charges for\n\nYou can use GitHub without incurring any costs. If you choose a paid plan, subscribe to a paid product, or use more than the allowance included in your plan for a billed product, then you will need to pay GitHub for your usage.\n\n* **GitHub plans**: A fixed monthly cost for a paid GitHub account (for example: GitHub Pro or GitHub Team) or Copilot plan.\n* **Subscriptions**: Fixed monthly costs for any additional products you subscribe to (for example: GitHub Secret Protection)\n* **Metered usage**: Variable costs that depend on how much you use certain features above the amounts included with your GitHub plan (for example: GitHub Actions). For more information see, [Product usage included with each plan](/en/billing/reference/product-usage-included) and [Budgets and alerts](/en/billing/concepts/budgets-and-alerts).\n\n> \\[!TIP]\n> GitHub has discounted plans for verified students and academic faculties, and for non-profit organizations. For more information, see [Discounted plans for GitHub accounts](/en/billing/concepts/discounted-plans).\n\n## How does billing work?\n\nGitHub bills you separately for each account you own (personal, organization, or enterprise). Each account has a separate:\n\n* Billing date\n* Billing period for GitHub plans\n* Payment method of credit card, PayPal, or a connected Azure subscription\n* Receipt\n\nIf required, GitHub Enterprise Cloud accounts can request a purchase order by contacting their account manager in [GitHub's Sales team](https://github.com/enterprise/contact).\n\n## When will I be charged?\n\nEach account has a **billing date** and a **billing cycle**.\n\nFor **personal and organization accounts** set up for credit card and PayPal payments, the **billing date** is typically the day you started a paid plan (not necessarily when the account was created). For example, if you started a paid plan on the 15th of a month, you will be billed on the 15th of each subsequent month. For payments using an Azure subscription ID, the billing date is available in the Azure commerce portal.\n\nFor **enterprise accounts**, your **billing date** will vary. See [Billing cycles](/en/billing/concepts/billing-cycles).\n\nMost users pay for GitHub using metered billing. The **billing cycle** for all metered products is a fixed period from the first day to the last day of the month.\n\n### Authorization holds\n\nYou may see an authorization hold on your provided payment method upon initiating a subscription or trial. Depending on your bank or card issuer, this may result in the appearance of a transaction or charge.\n\nAuthorization holds are temporary and released as quickly as possible. If the authorization hold persists for longer than 10 business days, we suggest reaching out to your bank or card issuer.\n\nIf the authorization is unsuccessful, the chosen service will not be activated and the account may be locked. For more more information, see [Unlocking a locked account](/en/billing/how-tos/troubleshooting/locked-account#unlocking-an-accounts-features-due-to-a-failed-authorization-hold).\n\n## How do I see what I'm billed for?\n\nYou can see the billing and usage information for your account at anytime in the \"Billing and licensing\" pages of your account or using the REST API. For more information, see [Viewing your usage of metered products and licenses](/en/billing/how-tos/products/view-productlicense-use).\n\n## Next steps\n\n* [Types of GitHub accounts](/en/get-started/learning-about-github/types-of-github-accounts)\n* [Managing your payment and billing information](/en/billing/how-tos/set-up-payment/manage-payment-info)\n* [Setting up budgets to control spending on metered products](/en/billing/how-tos/set-up-budgets)\n* [Adding a sales tax certificate](/en/billing/how-tos/set-up-payment/add-sales-tax-certificate)"}