Token counting

Python

To learn how to install or update the Vertex AI SDK for Python, see Install the Vertex AI SDK for Python. For more information, see the Python API reference documentation.

import vertexai
from vertexai.generative_models import GenerativeModel

# TODO(developer): Update and un-comment below line
# project_id = "PROJECT_ID"

vertexai.init(project=project_id, location="us-central1")

model = GenerativeModel(model_name="gemini-1.5-flash-001")

prompt = "Why is the sky blue?"

# Prompt tokens count
response = model.count_tokens(prompt)
print(f"Prompt Token Count: {response.total_tokens}")
print(f"Prompt Character Count: {response.total_billable_characters}")

# Send text to Gemini
response = model.generate_content(prompt)

# Response tokens count
usage_metadata = response.usage_metadata
print(f"Prompt Token Count: {usage_metadata.prompt_token_count}")
print(f"Candidates Token Count: {usage_metadata.candidates_token_count}")
print(f"Total Token Count: {usage_metadata.total_token_count}")

Java

Before trying this sample, follow the Java setup instructions in the Vertex AI quickstart using client libraries. For more information, see the Vertex AI Java API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Vertex AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

import com.google.cloud.vertexai.VertexAI;
import com.google.cloud.vertexai.api.CountTokensResponse;
import com.google.cloud.vertexai.api.GenerateContentResponse;
import com.google.cloud.vertexai.generativeai.GenerativeModel;
import java.io.IOException;

public class GetTokenCount {
  public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
    // TODO(developer): Replace these variables before running the sample.
    String projectId = "your-google-cloud-project-id";
    String location = "us-central1";
    String modelName = "gemini-1.5-flash-001";

    getTokenCount(projectId, location, modelName);
  }

  // Gets the number of tokens for the prompt and the model's response.
  public static int getTokenCount(String projectId, String location, String modelName)
      throws IOException {
    // Initialize client that will be used to send requests.
    // This client only needs to be created once, and can be reused for multiple requests.
    try (VertexAI vertexAI = new VertexAI(projectId, location)) {
      GenerativeModel model = new GenerativeModel(modelName, vertexAI);

      String textPrompt = "Why is the sky blue?";
      CountTokensResponse response = model.countTokens(textPrompt);

      int promptTokenCount = response.getTotalTokens();
      int promptCharCount = response.getTotalBillableCharacters();

      System.out.println("Prompt token Count: " + promptTokenCount);
      System.out.println("Prompt billable character count: " + promptCharCount);

      GenerateContentResponse contentResponse = model.generateContent(textPrompt);

      int tokenCount = contentResponse.getUsageMetadata().getPromptTokenCount();
      int candidateTokenCount = contentResponse.getUsageMetadata().getCandidatesTokenCount();
      int totalTokenCount = contentResponse.getUsageMetadata().getTotalTokenCount();

      System.out.println("Prompt token Count: " + tokenCount);
      System.out.println("Candidate Token Count: " + candidateTokenCount);
      System.out.println("Total token Count: " + totalTokenCount);

      return promptTokenCount;
    }
  }
}

Node.js

Before trying this sample, follow the Node.js setup instructions in the Vertex AI quickstart using client libraries. For more information, see the Vertex AI Node.js API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Vertex AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

const {VertexAI} = require('@google-cloud/vertexai');

/**
 * TODO(developer): Update these variables before running the sample.
 */
async function countTokens(
  projectId = 'PROJECT_ID',
  location = 'us-central1',
  model = 'gemini-1.5-flash-001'
) {
  // Initialize Vertex with your Cloud project and location
  const vertexAI = new VertexAI({project: projectId, location: location});

  // Instantiate the model
  const generativeModel = vertexAI.getGenerativeModel({
    model: model,
  });

  const req = {
    contents: [{role: 'user', parts: [{text: 'How are you doing today?'}]}],
  };

  const countTokensResp = await generativeModel.countTokens(req);
  console.log('count tokens response: ', countTokensResp);
}

REST

To get the token count and the number of billable characters for a prompt by using the Vertex AI API, send a POST request to the publisher model endpoint.

Before using any of the request data, make the following replacements:

• LOCATION: The region to process the request. Available options include the following:

  Click to expand a partial list of available regions

  • us-central1
  • us-west4
  • northamerica-northeast1
  • us-east4
  • us-west1
  • asia-northeast3
  • asia-southeast1
  • asia-northeast1
• PROJECT_ID: Your project ID.
• MODEL_ID: The model ID of the multimodal model that you want to use.
• ROLE: The role in a conversation associated with the content. Specifying a role is required even in singleturn use cases. Acceptable values include the following:
  • USER: Specifies content that's sent by you.
• TEXT: The text instructions to include in the prompt.
• NAME: The name of the function to call.
• DESCRIPTION: Description and purpose of the function.

HTTP method and URL:

POST https://LOCATION-aiplatform.googleapis.com/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/locations/LOCATION/publishers/google/models/MODEL_ID:countTokens

Request JSON body:

{
  "contents": [{
    "role": "ROLE",
    "parts": [{
      "text": "TEXT"
    }]
  }],
  "system_instruction": {
    "role": "ROLE",
    "parts": [{
      "text": "TEXT"
    }]
  }
  "tools": [{
    "function_declarations": [
      {
        "name": "NAME",
        "description": "DESCRIPTION",
        "parameters": {
          "type": "OBJECT",
          "properties": {
            "location": {
              "type": "TYPE",
              "description": "DESCRIPTION"
            }
          },
          "required": [
            "location"
          ]
        }
      }
    ]
  }]
}

To send your request, choose one of these options:

curl -X POST \
     -H "Authorization: Bearer $(gcloud auth print-access-token)" \
     -H "Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8" \
     -d @request.json \
     "https://LOCATION-aiplatform.googleapis.com/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/locations/LOCATION/publishers/google/models/MODEL_ID:countTokens"

$cred = gcloud auth print-access-token
$headers = @{ "Authorization" = "Bearer $cred" }

Invoke-WebRequest `
    -Method POST `
    -Headers $headers `
    -ContentType: "application/json; charset=utf-8" `
    -InFile request.json `
    -Uri "https://LOCATION-aiplatform.googleapis.com/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/locations/LOCATION/publishers/google/models/MODEL_ID:countTokens" | Select-Object -Expand Content

You should receive a JSON response similar to the following.

{ "totalTokens": 43 }

Console

To get the token count for a prompt by using Vertex AI Studio in the Google Cloud console, perform the following steps:

1. In the Vertex AI section of the Google Cloud console, go to the Vertex AI Studio page.

   Go to Vertex AI Studio

2. In Prompt design (single turn), click Open.

3. Optional: Configure the model and parameters:

   • Model: Select a model.
   • Region: Select the region that you want to use.

   • Temperature: Use the slider or textbox to enter a value for temperature.

     The temperature is used for sampling during response generation, which occurs when topP and topK are applied. Temperature controls the degree of randomness in token selection. Lower temperatures are good for prompts that require a less open-ended or creative response, while higher temperatures can lead to more diverse or creative results. A temperature of 0 means that the highest probability tokens are always selected. In this case, responses for a given prompt are mostly deterministic, but a small amount of variation is still possible.

     If the model returns a response that's too generic, too short, or the model gives a fallback response, try increasing the temperature.

   • Output token limit: Use the slider or textbox to enter a value for the max output limit.

     Maximum number of tokens that can be generated in the response. A token is approximately four characters. 100 tokens correspond to roughly 60-80 words.

     Specify a lower value for shorter responses and a higher value for potentially longer responses.

   • Add stop sequence: Optional. Enter a stop sequence, which is a series of characters that includes spaces. If the model encounters a stop sequence, the response generation stops. The stop sequence isn't included in the response, and you can add up to five stop sequences.
4. Optional: To configure advanced parameters, click Advanced and configure as follows:

   Click to expand advanced configurations

   • Top-K: Use the slider or textbox to enter a value for top-K.

     Top-K changes how the model selects tokens for output. A top-K of 1 means the next selected token is the most probable among all tokens in the model's vocabulary (also called greedy decoding), while a top-K of 3 means that the next token is selected from among the three most probable tokens by using temperature.

     For each token selection step, the top-K tokens with the highest probabilities are sampled. Then tokens are further filtered based on top-P with the final token selected using temperature sampling.

     Specify a lower value for less random responses and a higher value for more random responses.

   • Top-P: Use the slider or textbox to enter a value for top-P. Tokens are selected from most probable to the least until the sum of their probabilities equals the value of top-P. For the least variable results, set top-P to 0.
   • Enable Grounding: Add a grounding source and path to customize this feature.
5. Enter your text prompt in the Prompt pane.
6. To display the number of tokens calculated in your audio files, the number of text tokens, and the sum of all tokens, click View tokens. You can view the tokens or token IDs of your text prompt.
   • To view the tokens in the text prompt that are highlighted with different colors marking the boundary of each token ID, click Token ID to text. Media tokens aren't supported.
   • To view the token IDs, click Token ID.

     To close the tokenizer tool pane, click X, or click outside of the pane.