add-provider-package by vercel-labs/ai

Adding a New Provider Package

This guide covers the process of creating a new @ai-sdk/<provider> package to integrate an AI service into the AI SDK.

First-Party vs Third-Party Providers

Third-party packages: Any provider can create a third-party package. We're happy to link to it from our documentation.
First-party @ai-sdk/<provider> packages: If you prefer a first-party package, please create an issue first to discuss.

Reference Example

See https://github.com/vercel/ai/pull/8136/files for a complete example of adding a new provider.

Provider Architecture

The AI SDK uses a layered provider architecture following the adapter pattern:

Specifications (@ai-sdk/provider): Defines interfaces like LanguageModelV3, EmbeddingModelV3, etc.
Utilities (@ai-sdk/provider-utils): Shared code for implementing providers
Providers (@ai-sdk/<provider>): Concrete implementations for each AI service
Core (ai): High-level functions like generateText, streamText, generateObject

Step-by-Step Guide

1. Create Package Structure

Create a new folder packages/<provider> with the following structure:

packages/<provider>/
├── src/
│   ├── index.ts                  # Main exports
│   ├── version.ts                # Package version
│   ├── <provider>-provider.ts    # Provider implementation
│   ├── <provider>-provider.test.ts
│   ├── <provider>-*-options.ts   # Model-specific options
│   └── <provider>-*-model.ts     # Model implementations (e.g., language, embedding, image)
├── package.json
├── tsconfig.json
├── tsconfig.build.json
├── tsup.config.ts
├── turbo.json
├── vitest.node.config.js
├── vitest.edge.config.js
└── README.md

Do not create a CHANGELOG.md file. It will be auto-generated.

2. Configure package.json

Set up your package.json with:

"name": "@ai-sdk/<provider>"
"version": "0.0.0" (initial version, will be updated by changeset)
"license": "Apache-2.0"
"sideEffects": false
Dependencies on @ai-sdk/provider and @ai-sdk/provider-utils (use workspace:*)
Dev dependencies: @ai-sdk/test-server, @types/node, @vercel/ai-tsconfig, tsup, typescript, zod
"engines": { "node": ">=18" }
Peer dependency on zod (both v3 and v4): "zod": "^3.25.76 || ^4.1.8"

Example exports configuration:

{
  "exports": {
    "./package.json": "./package.json",
    ".": {
      "types": "./dist/index.d.ts",
      "import": "./dist/index.mjs",
      "require": "./dist/index.js"
    }
  }
}

3. Create TypeScript Configurations

tsconfig.json:

{
  "extends": "@vercel/ai-tsconfig/base.json",
  "include": ["src/**/*.ts"],
  "exclude": ["node_modules", "dist"]
}

tsconfig.build.json:

{
  "extends": "./tsconfig.json",
  "exclude": [
    "**/*.test.ts",
    "**/*.test-d.ts",
    "**/__snapshots__",
    "**/__fixtures__"
  ]
}

4. Configure Build Tool (tsup)

Create tsup.config.ts:

import { defineConfig } from 'tsup';

export default defineConfig({
  entry: ['src/index.ts'],
  format: ['cjs', 'esm'],
  dts: true,
  sourcemap: true,
  clean: true,
});

5. Configure Test Runners

Create both vitest.node.config.js and vitest.edge.config.js (copy from existing provider like anthropic).

6. Implement Provider

Provider implementation pattern:

// <provider>-provider.ts
import { NoSuchModelError } from '@ai-sdk/provider';
import { loadApiKey } from '@ai-sdk/provider-utils';

export interface ProviderSettings {
  apiKey?: string;
  baseURL?: string;
  // provider-specific settings
}

export class ProviderInstance {
  readonly apiKey?: string;
  readonly baseURL?: string;

  constructor(options: ProviderSettings = {}) {
    this.apiKey = options.apiKey;
    this.baseURL = options.baseURL;
  }

  private get baseConfig() {
    return {
      apiKey: () =>
        loadApiKey({
          apiKey: this.apiKey,
          environmentVariableName: 'PROVIDER_API_KEY',
          description: 'Provider API key',
        }),
      baseURL: this.baseURL ?? 'https://api.provider.com',
    };
  }

  languageModel(modelId: string) {
    return new ProviderLanguageModel(modelId, this.baseConfig);
  }

  // Shorter alias
  chat(modelId: string) {
    return this.languageModel(modelId);
  }
}

// Export default instance
export const providerName = new ProviderInstance();

7. Implement Model Classes

Each model type (language, embedding, image, etc.) should implement the appropriate interface from @ai-sdk/provider:

LanguageModelV3 for text generation models
EmbeddingModelV3 for embedding models
ImageModelV1 for image generation models
etc.

Schema guidelines:

Provider Options (user-facing):

Use .optional() unless null is meaningful
Be as restrictive as possible for future flexibility

Response Schemas (API responses):

Use .nullish() instead of .optional()
Keep minimal - only include properties you need
Allow flexibility for provider API changes

8. Create README.md

Include:

Brief description linking to documentation
Installation instructions
Basic usage example
Link to full documentation

9. Write Tests

Unit tests for provider logic
API response parsing tests using fixtures in __fixtures__ subdirectory
Both Node.js and Edge runtime tests

See capture-api-response-test-fixture skill for capturing real API responses for testing.

10. Add Examples

Create examples in examples/ai-functions/src/ for each model type the provider supports:

generate-text/<provider>.ts - Basic text generation
stream-text/<provider>.ts - Streaming text
generate-object/<provider>.ts - Structured output (if supported)
stream-object/<provider>.ts - Streaming structured output (if supported)
embed/<provider>.ts - Embeddings (if supported)
generate-image/<provider>.ts - Image generation (if supported)
etc.

Add feature-specific examples as needed (e.g., <provider>-tool-call.ts, <provider>-cache-control.ts).

11. Add Documentation

Create documentation in content/providers/01-ai-sdk-providers/<last number + 10>-<provider>.mdx

Include:

Setup instructions
Available models
Model capabilities
Provider-specific options
Usage examples
API configuration

12. Create Changeset

Run pnpm changeset and:

Select the new provider package
Choose major version (for new packages starting at 0.0.0)
Describe what the package provides

13. Update References

Run pnpm update-references from the workspace root to update tsconfig references.

14. Build and Test

# From workspace root
pnpm build

# From provider package
cd packages/<provider>
pnpm test              # Run all tests
pnpm test:node         # Run Node.js tests
pnpm test:edge         # Run Edge tests
pnpm type-check        # Type checking

# From workspace root
pnpm type-check:full   # Full type check including examples

15. Run Examples

Test your examples:

cd examples/ai-functions
pnpm tsx src/generate-text/<provider>.ts
pnpm tsx src/stream-text/<provider>.ts

Provider Method Naming

Full names: languageModel(id), imageModel(id), embeddingModel(id) (required)
Short aliases: .chat(id), .image(id), .embedding(id) (for DX)

File Naming Conventions

Source files: kebab-case.ts
Test files: kebab-case.test.ts
Type test files: kebab-case.test-d.ts
Provider classes: <Provider>Provider, <Provider>LanguageModel, etc.

Security Best Practices

Never use JSON.parse directly - use parseJSON or safeParseJSON from @ai-sdk/provider-utils
Load API keys securely using loadApiKey from @ai-sdk/provider-utils
Validate all API responses against schemas

Error Handling

Errors should extend AISDKError from @ai-sdk/provider and use a marker pattern:

import { AISDKError } from '@ai-sdk/provider';

const name = 'AI_ProviderError';
const marker = `vercel.ai.error.${name}`;
const symbol = Symbol.for(marker);

export class ProviderError extends AISDKError {
  private readonly [symbol] = true;

  constructor({ message, cause }: { message: string; cause?: unknown }) {
    super({ name, message, cause });
  }

  static isInstance(error: unknown): error is ProviderError {
    return AISDKError.hasMarker(error, marker);
  }
}

Pre-release Mode

If main is set up to publish beta releases, no further action is necessary. Just make sure not to backport it to the vX.Y stable branch since it will result in an npm version conflict once we exit pre-release mode on main.

Checklist

Common Issues

Missing tsconfig references: Run pnpm update-references from workspace root
Type errors in examples: Run pnpm type-check:full to catch issues early
Test failures: Ensure both Node and Edge tests pass
Build errors: Check that tsup.config.ts is configured correctly

add-provider-package