Delete a character

curl --request DELETE \
  --url https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id} \
  --header 'X-Api-Key: <api-key>'

const options = {method: 'DELETE', headers: {'X-Api-Key': '<api-key>'}};

fetch('https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id}', options)
  .then(res => res.json())
  .then(res => console.log(res))
  .catch(err => console.error(err));

<?php

$curl = curl_init();

curl_setopt_array($curl, [
  CURLOPT_URL => "https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id}",
  CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER => true,
  CURLOPT_ENCODING => "",
  CURLOPT_MAXREDIRS => 10,
  CURLOPT_TIMEOUT => 30,
  CURLOPT_HTTP_VERSION => CURL_HTTP_VERSION_1_1,
  CURLOPT_CUSTOMREQUEST => "DELETE",
  CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER => [
    "X-Api-Key: <api-key>"
  ],
]);

$response = curl_exec($curl);
$err = curl_error($curl);

curl_close($curl);

if ($err) {
  echo "cURL Error #:" . $err;
} else {
  echo $response;
}

package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"net/http"
	"io"
)

func main() {

	url := "https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id}"

	req, _ := http.NewRequest("DELETE", url, nil)

	req.Header.Add("X-Api-Key", "<api-key>")

	res, _ := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)

	defer res.Body.Close()
	body, _ := io.ReadAll(res.Body)

	fmt.Println(string(body))

}

require 'uri'
require 'net/http'

url = URI("https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id}")

http = Net::HTTP.new(url.host, url.port)
http.use_ssl = true

request = Net::HTTP::Delete.new(url)
request["X-Api-Key"] = '<api-key>'

response = http.request(request)
puts response.read_body

{
  "id": "char_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2NABCDEFGHJKMR",
  "object": "character",
  "deleted": true
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

DELETE

characters

{id}

Delete a character

curl --request DELETE \
  --url https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id} \
  --header 'X-Api-Key: <api-key>'

const options = {method: 'DELETE', headers: {'X-Api-Key': '<api-key>'}};

fetch('https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id}', options)
  .then(res => res.json())
  .then(res => console.log(res))
  .catch(err => console.error(err));

<?php

$curl = curl_init();

curl_setopt_array($curl, [
  CURLOPT_URL => "https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id}",
  CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER => true,
  CURLOPT_ENCODING => "",
  CURLOPT_MAXREDIRS => 10,
  CURLOPT_TIMEOUT => 30,
  CURLOPT_HTTP_VERSION => CURL_HTTP_VERSION_1_1,
  CURLOPT_CUSTOMREQUEST => "DELETE",
  CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER => [
    "X-Api-Key: <api-key>"
  ],
]);

$response = curl_exec($curl);
$err = curl_error($curl);

curl_close($curl);

if ($err) {
  echo "cURL Error #:" . $err;
} else {
  echo $response;
}

package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"net/http"
	"io"
)

func main() {

	url := "https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id}"

	req, _ := http.NewRequest("DELETE", url, nil)

	req.Header.Add("X-Api-Key", "<api-key>")

	res, _ := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)

	defer res.Body.Close()
	body, _ := io.ReadAll(res.Body)

	fmt.Println(string(body))

}

require 'uri'
require 'net/http'

url = URI("https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{id}")

http = Net::HTTP.new(url.host, url.port)
http.use_ssl = true

request = Net::HTTP::Delete.new(url)
request["X-Api-Key"] = '<api-key>'

response = http.request(request)
puts response.read_body

{
  "id": "char_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2NABCDEFGHJKMR",
  "object": "character",
  "deleted": true
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "type": "invalid_request",
    "code": "balance_too_low",
    "message": "Team available balance is 1.5 credits, generation requires 2.0.",
    "doc_url": "https://docs.aurous-labs.com/errors#balance_too_low",
    "request_id": "req_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM",
    "param": "prompt",
    "reason": "wrong_view",
    "detected_view": "full_left"
  }
}

DELETE /v1/characters/{id} removes a character. The branching is automatic, based on status:

draft → hard-delete. Nothing was ever charged for a draft, so the row goes and the id stops resolving. Photos you uploaded are removed when the draft is deleted or purged; a rejected upload is discarded after its 24-hour ticket window. This is how you clean up drafts you abandoned.
reviewing → hard-delete (cancel-review). Every reference is discarded — the generated ones and the photos you uploaded — and the row is removed entirely. Subsequent retrieval returns 404. Use this when synthesis produced refs you don’t want to keep; call POST /v1/characters/{id}/save first if you want to keep any of them.
synthesizing → cancel. The pending render is stopped, the up-front charge is refunded, and the row plus any partial refs are hard-deleted; a character.cancelled webhook fires. If the render finishes in the same instant it is finalized instead and the row settles in its terminal state — either way it is gone from list and retrieve.
Any other status (ready, failed) → soft-delete. Sets deleted_at, transitions status to deleted. The row remains for ID stability (you can still GET /v1/characters/{id} for audit), but it is excluded from GET /v1/characters and rejected by POST /v1/images or POST /v1/videos.

This endpoint never charges credits and does not refund credits already spent on synthesis.

When to use

Drop a draft: you started a builder character and changed your mind. A draft costs nothing to keep, but it does show up in GET /v1/characters — delete it and it is gone for good.
Cancel-review: the synthesize flow produced refs you reject; you want the character gone, not archived.
Soft-delete ready: retire a character you no longer plan to use. Past generations that already reference it on GET /v1/images/{id} are unaffected, but the character can no longer be attached to new requests.
Soft-delete failed: clean up a failed synthesis attempt you don’t want to retry. To retry instead, call POST /v1/characters/{id}/resynthesize — no delete needed. Only fall back to delete + recreate (with fresh upload_ids) if resynthesize returns 422 uploads_expired.

Examples

curl -X DELETE https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/char_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2VNABCDEFGHJKM \
  -H "X-Api-Key: $AUROUS_API_KEY"

const result = await fetch(
  `https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/${id}`,
  { method: "DELETE", headers: { "X-Api-Key": process.env.AUROUS_API_KEY! } },
).then((r) => r.json());

console.log(result.deleted); // true

import os, requests

r = requests.delete(
    f"https://api.aurous-labs.com/v1/characters/{character_id}",
    headers={"X-Api-Key": os.environ["AUROUS_API_KEY"]},
).json()

print(r["deleted"])  # True

Limits

Rate limit: bucket characters_post — 30 requests/min sustained, 60 burst per team.

Errors

Code	HTTP	When
`resource_not_found`	404	Unknown ID or cross-team. The 404 is intentional — cross-team existence is never leaked.
`character_busy`	409	A `draft` started building in the same instant the delete ran. Re-read `GET /v1/characters/{id}` and retry after `Retry-After` seconds.

Common pitfalls

A draft and a reviewing character are hard-deleted — the row vanishes. Subsequent GET /v1/characters/{id} returns 404, and there is no undo. On a reviewing character, call POST /v1/characters/{id}/save first if you cared about the refs — cancelling takes the photos you uploaded with it, not only the generated views. On a draft, the same is true: deleting it takes your uploaded photos with it, not just the character record — photos you uploaded are removed when the draft is deleted or purged; a rejected upload is discarded after its 24-hour ticket window.
Deleting a single view is a different route: DELETE /v1/characters/{id}/refs/{view}, which empties one slot on a draft and leaves the character in place.
Soft-deleting a ready character does not affect generations you already produced — their output_urls continue to work and the character ID still appears on past GET /v1/images/{id} responses.
Calling DELETE a second time on the same character returns 404, since soft-deleted rows are filtered out for IDOR safety. Treat the first 200 as the only success signal you need.

Authorizations

X-Api-Key

string

header

required

Your team API key (starts with al_live_).

Headers

Aurous-Version

string

Optional API version pin (YYYY-MM-DD). Omit the header to receive the platform default, currently 2026-08-26.

Pattern: ^\d{4}-\d{2}-\d{2}$

Example:

"2026-08-26"

Path Parameters

string

required

Opaque character ID

Example:

"char_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2NABCDEFGHJKMR"

Response

Character deleted

string

required

Character ID echoed back.

Example:

"char_01HXMQ7Z3K8Y2NABCDEFGHJKMR"

object

enum<string>

required

Discriminator

Available options:

character

Example:

"character"

deleted

boolean

required

Always true on a successful delete.

Example:

true

Get started

Guides

Concepts

API Reference

Resources

Delete a character

When to use

Examples

Limits

Errors

Common pitfalls

Authorizations

Headers

Path Parameters

Response

​When to use

​Examples

​Limits

​Errors

​Common pitfalls

Authorizations

Headers

Path Parameters

Response

When to use

Examples

Limits

Errors

Common pitfalls