Nous Tool Gateway

One subscription. Every tool built in.

The Tool Gateway is included with every paid Nous Portal subscription. It routes Tutou' tool calls — web search, image generation, text-to-speech, and cloud browser automation — through infrastructure Nous already runs, so you don't have to sign up with a web search vendor, FAL, OpenAI, Browser Use, or anyone else just to make your agent useful.

Start or manage subscription →

What's included

	Tool	What you get
🔍	Web search & extract	Agent-grade web search and full-page extraction, managed by Nous. No rate limits to worry about — the gateway handles scaling.
🎨	Image generation	One Nous Subscription row spanning the FAL catalog, the native Krea 2 models, and Nous Portal image models: FLUX 2, GPT Image, Nano Banana, Seedream, Ideogram, Recraft, Qwen, Krea 2, and more. Pick the model once in tutou tools, which shows the live list.
🔊	Text-to-speech	OpenAI TTS voices wired into the text_to_speech tool. Drop voice notes into Telegram, generate audio for pipelines, narrate anything.
🌐	Cloud browser automation	Headless Chromium sessions via Browser Use. browser_navigate, browser_click, browser_type, browser_vision — all the agent-driving primitives, no Browserbase account required.

All four are pay-as-you-use billed against your Nous subscription. Use any combination — run the gateway for web and images while keeping your own ElevenLabs key for TTS, or route everything through Nous.

Why it's here

Building an agent that can actually do things means stitching together 5+ API subscriptions — each with their own signup, rate limits, billing, and quirks. The gateway collapses that into one account:

• One bill. Pay Nous; we handle the rest.
• One signup. No web search, FAL, Browser Use, or OpenAI audio accounts to manage.
• One key. Your Nous Portal OAuth covers every tool.
• Same quality. Same backends the direct-key route uses — just fronted by us.

Bring your own keys anytime — per-tool, whenever you want to. The gateway isn't a lock-in, it's a shortcut.

Get started

There are three ways in — pick whichever fits where you are:

tutou setup --portal     # Fresh install: Nous OAuth + set Nous as provider + turn on the Tool Gateway in one go

tutou model              # Switch your inference provider to Nous Portal — Tutou then offers to turn on the gateway for all tools

tutou tools              # Enable the gateway per-tool — pick "Nous Subscription" for any tool you want

tutou setup --portal and tutou model are the all-at-once paths: log in once, optionally flip every tool to the gateway. tutou tools is the à la carte path — turn on just the tools you want, one at a time.

You don't have to log in first. With tutou tools, the Nous-managed backends (Web search, Image, Video, TTS, Browser) are always listed, even if you've never signed into Nous Portal. Select one and Tutou runs the Portal login right there if you aren't already authenticated — no need to run tutou model beforehand. If your Nous OAuth is already active, selecting the backend enables it immediately with no extra prompt. This path only logs you in and turns on the one tool you picked — it does not switch your inference provider, and it does not prompt you to enable the gateway for every other tool.

Check what's active at any time:

tutou portal info        # Portal auth + Tool Gateway routing summary
tutou portal tools       # Gateway catalog with current routing per tool
tutou status --full      # Full system status (Tool Gateway is one section)

tutou portal info shows a section like:

◆ Nous Tool Gateway
  Nous Portal     ✓ managed tools available
  Web tools       ✓ active via Nous subscription
  Image gen       ✓ active via Nous subscription
  TTS             ✓ active via Nous subscription
  Browser         ○ active via Browser Use key

Tools marked "active via Nous subscription" are going through the gateway. Anything else is using your own keys.

Eligibility

The Tool Gateway is a paid-subscription feature. Upgrade your plan to unlock the gateway.

Some accounts are also entitled to a free tool pool — a small managed-tool allowance that covers gateway tool calls without a paid subscription. When a free pool is available, the gateway surfaces it and shows a setup prompt on first use, so you can opt in and start using managed tools right away.

The enablement checklist

Picking a Nous model (tutou model) offers a per-tool checklist of gateway backends. Its behavior respects your existing setup:

• Tools you've explicitly pointed at another backend (e.g. web.backend: searxng, browser.cloud_provider: camofox) are never offered — your selection can't be accidentally overwritten.
• Tools configured via environment variables alone (e.g. SEARXNG_URL, CAMOFOX_URL) are offered unchecked, labeled to keep your own backend.
• Only genuinely unconfigured tools come pre-checked.
• Declines stick: if you submit the checklist with a tool unchecked, it won't be pre-checked on future Nous model swaps (stored in tool_gateway_declined_tools in config.yaml; checking it later clears the decline).

Mix and match

The gateway is per-tool. Turn it on for just what you want:

• All tools through Nous — easiest; one subscription, done.
• Gateway for web + images, bring your own TTS — keep your ElevenLabs voice, let Nous handle the rest.
• Gateway only for things you don't have keys for — "I already pay for Browserbase, but I don't want a web search account" works fine.

Switch any tool at any time via:

tutou tools          # Interactive picker for each tool category

Select the tool, pick Nous Subscription as the provider (or any direct provider you prefer). No config editing required. If you aren't logged into Nous Portal yet, picking Nous Subscription kicks off the Portal login inline — you don't need to authenticate through tutou model first.

Using individual image models

The model is chosen once, in tutou tools → Image Generation, and stored in config.yaml as image_gen.model. Every image_generate call uses that stored model — the tool has no model parameter, so there is no per-call override. Leave it unset and Tutou uses FLUX 2 Klein 9B.

The Nous Subscription row has one model picker that lists every model once. The stored id decides which gateway serves the request: a native Krea id (krea-2-medium, krea-2-large, krea-2-medium-turbo) goes to the Krea gateway, a FAL catalog id goes to FAL, and any other id goes to Nous Portal. The selection is still just image_gen.provider: nous plus the model id.

Krea 2 (Medium, Large, Medium Turbo — up to 10 style-reference images, optional Enhance upscale) and the Nous Portal image models sit in that same picker rather than behind rows of their own. They need a paid subscription — the free tool pool funds the FAL models only. The Krea-via-FAL ids (fal-ai/krea/v2/...) stay on the direct FAL.ai row.

Model ids, speeds, and prices live on the Image Generation page. The set evolves — tutou tools → Image Generation shows the current live list.

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Configuration reference

Most users never need to touch this — tutou model and tutou tools cover every workflow interactively. This section is for writing config.yaml directly or scripting setups.

One selection key per tool category

Each tool category has a single provider-selection key, written by the tutou tools picker (or the desktop GUI). Picking the Nous Subscription row stores the value nous, which routes that category through the managed Tool Gateway. Picking a BYOK row stores the vendor name (fal, openai, firecrawl, browser-use, ...), which goes direct with your own credentials:

web:
  backend: nous          # web search/extract via the Tool Gateway

image_gen:
  provider: nous         # image generation via the Tool Gateway

tts:
  provider: nous         # TTS via the Tool Gateway

stt:
  provider: nous         # speech-to-text via the Tool Gateway

browser:
  cloud_provider: nous   # cloud browser via the Tool Gateway

The runtime always uses the stored selection — credential presence never selects or reroutes a category. A FAL_KEY sitting in .env is ignored while image_gen.provider: nous; conversely, image_gen.provider: fal with no FAL_KEY set produces a clear error instead of silently falling back to the gateway:

image_gen is configured to use fal (set via tutou tools), but FAL_KEY is not set. Run 'tutou tools' to change it.

Categories you have never configured (no selection key ever written) autodetect from available credentials, same as before. But once a selection exists, adding a key to .env does not change the route — only tutou tools (or editing the selection key) does.

Switching back to your own keys

tutou tools    # pick the tool → choose a direct provider (e.g. Firecrawl)

Or set the selection key directly:

web:
  backend: firecrawl   # Tutou now uses FIRECRAWL_API_KEY from .env

Legacy use_gateway flag (deprecated)

Older Tutou versions used a per-tool use_gateway: true boolean to route through the gateway. That flag is legacy: it is never written anymore, and the tutou tools picker removes it from a category's config when it rewrites the selection. Old configs that still contain use_gateway: true are interpreted at read time as the nous selection, so existing setups keep working. Don't set use_gateway in new configs — select the provider in tutou tools instead.

Self-hosted gateway (advanced)

Running your own Nous-compatible gateway? Override endpoints in ~/.tutou/.env:

TOOL_GATEWAY_DOMAIN=your-domain.example.com
TOOL_GATEWAY_SCHEME=https
TOOL_GATEWAY_USER_TOKEN=your-token        # normally auto-populated from Portal login
FIRECRAWL_GATEWAY_URL=https://...         # override one endpoint specifically
TOOL_GATEWAY_URL=http://127.0.0.1:3009    # pin the shared managed origin exactly
CONNECTOR_GATEWAY_URL=http://127.0.0.1:3009 # pin the connectors origin exactly

Every host is named {label}-gateway.<domain>, and TOOL_GATEWAY_DOMAIN / TOOL_GATEWAY_SCHEME reshape all of them; a {LABEL}_GATEWAY_URL pins one host exactly and skips the derivation:

• {vendor}-gateway.<domain> — per-vendor passthroughs (Firecrawl, BFL, ...).
• tool-gateway.<domain> — the shared managed origin: the vendors hosted on the gateway itself plus media uploads.
• connector-gateway.<domain> — the connectors API (/v1/connectors/*), its own deployment. See Tool Search → Connectors.

These knobs exist for custom infrastructure setups (enterprise deployments, dev environments). Regular subscribers never set them.

FAQ

Does it work with Telegram / Discord / the other messaging gateways?

Yes. Tool Gateway operates at the tool-execution layer, not the CLI. Every interface that can call a tool — CLI, Telegram, Discord, Slack, IRC, Teams, the API server, anything — benefits from it transparently.

What happens if my subscription expires?

Tools routed through the gateway stop working until you renew or swap in direct API keys via tutou tools. Tutou shows a clear error pointing at the portal.

Can I see usage or costs per tool?

Yes — the Nous Portal dashboard breaks usage down by tool so you can see what's driving your bill.

Is Modal (serverless terminal) included?

Modal is available as an optional add-on through the Nous subscription, not part of the default Tool Gateway bundle. Configure it via tutou setup terminal or directly in config.yaml when you want a remote sandbox for shell execution.

Do I need to delete my existing API keys when I enable the gateway?

No — keep them in .env. While a tool's selection is Nous Subscription, direct keys for that tool are simply ignored. Pick the direct provider again in tutou tools and your keys become the source again. The gateway isn't a lock-in.