x402: HTTP Payments for the Machine Economy

HTTP 402 Payment Required has been a reserved status code since 1991, waiting for its moment. That moment is now.

The x402 standard (being developed by Coinbase and the broader web3 community) defines how servers express payment requirements and how clients fulfill them. Tollway builds on x402 with USDC on Base for fast, cheap, and auditable micropayments.

An agent that wants to train on content sends a signed request. The server responds with 402 and a payment address. The agent sends USDC on-chain and includes the transaction hash in a retry. The server verifies and responds with the content.