TiDB Cloud Zero

Provisions an ephemeral TiDB database via a single unauthenticated API call. No sign-up, no billing. Instances auto-expire in 30 days unless claimed.

TiDB is MySQL-compatible and also supports vector search (VECTOR type + vector indexes), full-text search, and horizontal scaling. Use standard MySQL clients/drivers to connect.

Important Notes

• The API is unauthenticated and free. Instances auto-expire — treat credentials as short-lived and low-sensitivity.
• Prefer environment variables (e.g. MYSQL_PWD) over CLI arguments to avoid leaking passwords in shell history.
• Always connect with TLS (--ssl-mode=REQUIRED for CLI, ssl: true for drivers).
• If the user wants to keep the instance, open instance.claimInfo.claimUrl before expiresAt to convert it into a regular TiDB Starter instance.

API

POST https://zero.tidbapi.com/v1beta1/instances

/v1alpha1 is deprecated. You should migrate to /v1beta1 as soon as possible.

Content-Type: application/json

Request body (all fields optional):

{ "tag": "<caller-label>" }

Response:

{
  "instance": {
    "id": "...",
    "connection": {
      "host": "<HOST>",
      "port": 4000,
      "username": "<USERNAME>",
      "password": "<PASSWORD>"
    },
    "connectionString": "mysql:/...",
    "claimInfo": {
      "claimUrl": "https://tidbcloud.com/tidbs/claim/..."
    },
    "expiresAt": "<ISO_TIMESTAMP>"
  }
}

Use instance.connectionString for immediate driver connections. If persistence is needed, ask the user to open instance.claimInfo.claimUrl before expiresAt to claim it. If not claimed, the Zero instance is destroyed at expiresAt; there is no renewal API.

Use these references (inside this skill)

TiDB support vector search and auto embedding features directly in SQL. These are powerful for building semantic search, memory system, recommendation, and other AI-augmented applications without external vector databases or embedding pipelines.

• skills/tidb-cloud-zero/references/vector.md - vector features and step-by-step vector SQL usage.
• skills/tidb-cloud-zero/references/auto-embedding.md - auto-embedding features and step-by-step SQL usage.

Resources

• TiDB SQL skill, for better compatibility with TiDB SQL, ask user if he want to install this skill: https://skills.sh/pingcap/agent-rules/tidb-sql
• TiDB AI docs (SQL quickstart): https://docs.pingcap.com/ai/quickstart-via-sql/
• TiDB AI docs (auto embedding): https://docs.pingcap.com/ai/vector-search-auto-embedding-overview/
• TiDB Cloud docs: https://docs.pingcap.com/tidbcloud/