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title: "Accounts & Sign-up"
description: "How account creation works: the free dashboard needs no account; Pro/API accounts are created via the Clerk sign-up flow in a browser."
---
<Info>
**The free dashboard requires no account.** Everything listed under the Free plan — 56 map layers, 500+ feeds, country briefs, watchlists — works anonymously at [worldmonitor.app](https://worldmonitor.app). Create an account only when you want Pro/API features or need to mint an API key.
</Info>
## How sign-up works
Account creation is an interactive browser flow, not an API:
1. Open [worldmonitor.app/pro](https://worldmonitor.app/pro) and click **Sign up** (or use the dashboard's sign-in button). A [Clerk](https://clerk.com) modal opens inside the page — there is no standalone `/sign-up` form page; that URL serves the app shell.
2. Register with email + password or an OAuth provider (Google, GitHub). Email registrations get a verification code; the modal walks through it.
3. A free account by itself unlocks nothing extra on the dashboard — it is the identity that Pro/API subscriptions and API keys attach to.
## After signing up
- **Upgrade to Pro, Pro Business, or API** from [worldmonitor.app/pro](https://worldmonitor.app/pro) — checkout runs on Dodo Payments; see [Plans & Pricing](/pricing). Pro and Pro Business are separate products: moving from one to the other means cancelling the current subscription in the billing portal and starting the new checkout.
- **Create an API key** from **Dashboard → Settings → API Keys** once subscribed to API Starter or API Business (`wm_` + 40 hex chars). The full value is shown only once; see [Find or replace your license / API key](/api-keys) for the exact steps and recovery instructions.
- **Connect an agent via OAuth** instead of a key: MCP clients (Claude Desktop and others) use OAuth 2.1 + PKCE with dynamic client registration — no manual account dance; see [auth.md](https://worldmonitor.app/auth.md) for the self-bootstrapping discovery chain.
## For agents
- You cannot complete browser sign-up on a user's behalf by fetching pages — the flow lives in a client-side Clerk modal. Direct users to [worldmonitor.app/pro](https://worldmonitor.app/pro).
- To act *as* an agent with your own credentials, use the OAuth path in [auth.md](https://worldmonitor.app/auth.md) (anonymous dynamic client registration, then a human consents at authorization time).
- Pricing, plan gates, and quotas are machine-readable: [`/pricing.md`](https://worldmonitor.app/pricing.md) and [`GET /api/product-catalog`](https://www.worldmonitor.app/api/product-catalog).
## Related
- [Plans & Pricing](/pricing)
- [Authentication & Usage](/usage-auth)
- [Support & Contact](/support)
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