> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://www.zinc.com/docs/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Agent Sandbox

> Let an agent get a working Zinc key with no signup, place a test order, and graduate to a real account without changing its code.

The **agent sandbox** removes the one step an autonomous agent can't take: signing up.

An agent that knows nothing but the Zinc hostname can mint its own sandbox key in a single unauthenticated call, place a test order, and watch it deliver — no account, no dashboard, no human. When it's time to go live, a human claims the sandbox into their real Zinc account and **the agent's key keeps working**.

```bash theme={null}
curl -X POST https://api.zinc.com/sandbox/keys
```

That's the whole prerequisite. The response carries a `zn_test_` key, a complete example order body, and a URL a human can use later to adopt the sandbox.

## Why it works this way

Every other path to an API key assumes a person: a signup form, an email confirmation, a dashboard visit. An agent evaluating whether it *can* buy something has none of those, and asking it to stop and wait for a human is what kills the integration before it starts.

So the funnel is inverted. The agent proves the integration works first, against sandbox data that costs nothing and risks nothing. The human shows up only at the end, to decide whether to adopt it — and adopting it doesn't invalidate anything the agent already built.

<Info>
  The mint response doubles as documentation. Agents read the bytes they get back, not a docs site, so every field they need to proceed — the key, a valid order body, the ordered next steps — is in the response itself.
</Info>

## The shape of it

<Steps>
  <Step title="Mint" stepNumber={1}>
    One unauthenticated `POST`. Returns a sandbox key, an example order, and a claim URL.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Build" stepNumber={2}>
    Place sandbox orders, watch the real lifecycle on a compressed clock, and rehearse every failure mode against magic product URLs.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Claim" stepNumber={3}>
    Hand the claim URL to the human you work for. The sandbox — order history and key — folds into their Zinc account.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Go live" stepNumber={4}>
    They fund a wallet and mint a live key. The agent swaps one string. Nothing else changes.
  </Step>
</Steps>

## What a sandbox key can and cannot do

|            |                                                                                                    |
| ---------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Can**    | Place and read sandbox orders, register test-mode webhooks, reproduce every documented error shape |
| **Cannot** | Touch live mode, spend money, or place a real order — claimed or not                               |

A minted account is **provisional**. It has no wallet and needs none: sandbox orders skip funding entirely. It isn't a signup either — no email required, nothing sent, no live account created.

<Warning>
  Sandbox keys **expire after 7 days without use**, and everything they created is sandbox data that's deleted with them. Any use resets the clock, so persist the key across runs rather than minting a fresh one each time.
</Warning>

## Who this is for

* **Agent builders** — get to a working order in the first session, decide later whether to open an account.
* **Platform and framework authors** — ship a Zinc integration your users can try with zero configuration.
* **Anyone evaluating Zinc** — exercise the real API surface, including the failure paths, before talking to us.

If you already have a Zinc account, you don't need any of this: mint a `zn_test_` key in the [dashboard](https://app.zinc.com) and read [Sandbox & Testing](/docs/v2/api-reference/introduction/sandbox) instead. The agent sandbox exists for the case where there's no account yet.

## Where the docs live

|                                                                      |                                                               |
| -------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------- |
| [**Quickstart**](/docs/v2/agent-sandbox/quickstart)                       | The walkthrough — mint, order, watch, rehearse failures       |
| [**Going Live**](/docs/v2/agent-sandbox/going-live)                       | Claiming a sandbox and graduating to a live key               |
| [**API Reference**](/docs/v2/api-reference/sandbox/overview)              | The four `/sandbox/*` routes, request and response by field   |
| [`GET /sandbox/quickstart`](https://api.zinc.com/sandbox/quickstart) | The same walkthrough as plain markdown, for the agent to read |

## Next steps

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="Quickstart" icon="rocket" href="/docs/v2/agent-sandbox/quickstart">
    Zero to a delivered sandbox order in about two minutes.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Going Live" icon="flag-checkered" href="/docs/v2/agent-sandbox/going-live">
    Claim the sandbox and swap in a live key.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>