An API key is a string of characters — like abc123xyz456 — that』s used to register Akismet for your site. After you sign up for Akismet, you』ll receive your API key by email.
Once you have your API key, you can activate the Akismet plugin in just a few steps:
Go to the Plugins tab of your WordPress dashboard.Find the Akismet plugin. Click the Activate link if it』s not already active.Go to Settings -> Akismet Anti-spam. If you have the Jetpack plugin installed, go to Jetpack -> Akismet Anti-spamEnter your API key in the box.Click the Connect with API Key button.
You can find alternative ways to activate Akismet here.
Did you lose your API key?
No problem — we』re happy to resend the API key.
Can I use the same API key for multiple sites?
Yep! If you have multiple personal sites that you want to protect with Akismet, you can use the same API key for each site.
If you have a paid plan, you can use the API key with multiple sites; however, our plans are capped by API calls per month depending on the tier you』ve subscribed to. The total of those API calls sent by all those sites is calculated.
Please note that if your site is not-personal, you will need to have a paid subscription. If you』re not sure if your site would qualify for a free key, you can refer to this page for help.
How about a Multisite install?
Unless every site is purely personal, each subsite in your Multisite install will need to have its own paid subscription, even if it』s using the same top level domain name.