Chargebee Python Client Library v3

Note

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This is the official Python library for integrating with Chargebee.

📘 For a complete reference of available APIs, check out our API Documentation.
🧪 To explore and test API capabilities interactively, head over to our API Explorer.

If you're upgrading from an older version please refer to the Migration Guide

Requirements

Python 3.11+

Installation

Install the latest version of the library with pip:

pip install chargebee

Install from source with:

python setup.py install

Documentation

See our Python API Reference.

Usage

The package needs to be configured with your site's API key, which is available under Configure Chargebee Section. Refer here for more details.

Configuring chargebee client

from chargebee import Chargebee
cb_client = Chargebee(api_key="", site="")

Configuring Timeouts

from chargebee import Chargebee
cb_client = Chargebee(api_key="api_key", site="site")
cb_client.update_read_timeout_secs(3000)
cb_client.update_connect_timeout_secs(5000)

Configuring Retry Delays

from chargebee import Chargebee
cb_client = Chargebee(api_key="api_key", site="site")
cb_client.update_export_retry_delay_ms(3000)
cb_client.update_time_travel_retry_delay_ms(5000)

Making API Request:

# Create a Customer
response = cb_client.Customer.create(
    cb_client.Customer.CreateParams(
        first_name="John",
        last_name="Doe",
        email="john@test.com",
        locale="fr-CA",
        billing_address=cb_client.Customer.BillingAddress(
            first_name="John",
            last_name=" Doe",
            line1="PO Box 9999",
            city="Walnut",
            state="California",
            zip="91789",
            country="US",
        ),
    )
)
customer = response.customer
card = response.card

Async HTTP client

Starting with version 3.9.0, the Chargebee Python SDK can optionally be configured to use an asynchronous HTTP client which uses asyncio to perform non-blocking requests. This can be enabled by passing the use_async_client=True argument to the constructor:

cb_client = Chargebee(api_key="api_key", site="site", use_async_client=True)

When configured to use the async client, all model methods return a coroutine, which will have to be awaited to get the response:

async def get_customers():
    response = await cb_client.Customer.list(
        cb_client.Customer.ListParams(first_name=Filters.StringFilter(IS="John"))
    )
    return response

Note: The async methods will have to be wrapped in an event loop during invocation. For example, the asyncio.run method can be used to run the above example:

import asyncio
response = asyncio.run(get_customers())

List API Request With Filter

For pagination, offset is the parameter that is being used. The value used for this parameter must be the value returned in next_offset parameter from the previous API call.

from chargebee import Filters
response = cb_client.Customer.list(
    cb_client.Customer.ListParams(first_name=Filters.StringFilter(IS="John"))
)
offset = response.next_offset
print(offset)

Using enums

There are two variants of enums in chargebee,

Global enums - These are defined globally and can be accessed across resources.
Resource specific enums - These are defined within a resource and can be accessed using the resource class name.

# Global Enum
import chargebee
response = cb_client.Customer.create(
    cb_client.Customer.CreateParams(
        first_name="John",
        auto_collection=chargebee.AutoCollection.ON,  # global enum
    )
)
print(response.customer)

# Resource Specific Enum
response = cb_client.Customer.change_billing_date(
    cb_client.Customer.ChangeBillingDateParams(
        first_name="John",
        billing_day_of_week=cb_client.Customer.BillingDayOfWeek.MONDAY,  # resource specific enum
    )
)
print(response.customer)

Using custom fields

response = cb_client.Customer.create(
    cb_client.Customer.CreateParams(
        first_name="John",
        cf_host_url="https://john.com",  # `cf_host_url` is a custom field in Customer object
    )
)
print(response.customer.cf_host_url)

Creating an idempotent request:

Idempotency keys are passed along with request headers to allow a safe retry of POST requests.

response = cb_client.Customer.create(
    cb_client.Customer.CreateParams(
        first_name="John",
        last_name="Doe",
        email="john@test.com",
        locale="fr-CA",
        billing_address=cb_client.Customer.BillingAddress(
            first_name="John",
            last_name=" Doe",
            line1="PO Box 9999",
            city="Walnut",
            state="California",
            zip="91789",
            country="US",
        ),
    ),
    None,
    {"chargebee-idempotency-key": "<<UUID>>"},  # Replace <<UUID>> with a unique string
)
customer = response.customer
card = response.card
responseHeaders = response.headers  # Retrieves response headers
print(responseHeaders)
idempotencyReplayedValue = (
    response.is_idempotency_replayed
)  # Retrieves Idempotency replayed header value
print(idempotencyReplayedValue)

Waiting for Process Completion

The response from the previous API call must be passed as an argument for wait_for_export_completion() or wait_for_time_travel_completion()

# Wait For Export Completion
from chargebee import Filters
response = cb_client.Export.customers(
    cb_client.Export.CustomersParams(
        customer=cb_client.Export.CustomersCustomerParams(
            first_name=Filters.StringFilter(IS="John")
        )
    )
)
print(cb_client.Export.wait_for_export_completion(response.export))

Retry Handling

Chargebee's SDK includes built-in retry logic to handle temporary network issues and server-side errors. This feature is disabled by default but can be enabled when needed.

Key features include:

Automatic retries for specific HTTP status codes: Retries are automatically triggered for status codes 500, 502, 503, and 504.
Exponential backoff: Retry delays increase exponentially to prevent overwhelming the server.
Rate limit management: If a 429 Too Many Requests response is received with a Retry-After header, the SDK waits for the specified duration before retrying.

Note: Exponential backoff and max retries do not apply in this case.
Customizable retry behavior: Retry logic can be configured using the retryConfig parameter in the environment configuration.

Example: Customizing Retry Logic

You can enable and configure the retry logic by passing a retryConfig object when initializing the Chargebee environment:

from chargebee import Chargebee
from chargebee.retry_config import RetryConfig
retry_config = RetryConfig(enabled=True, max_retries=5, delay_ms=1000, retry_on=[500])
cb_client = Chargebee(api_key="api_key", site="site")
cb_client.update_retry_config(retry_config)
# ... your Chargebee API operations ...

Example: Rate Limit retry logic

You can enable and configure the retry logic for rate-limit by passing a retryConfig object when initializing the Chargebee environment:

from chargebee import Chargebee
from chargebee.retry_config import RetryConfig
retry_config = RetryConfig(enabled=True, max_retries=5, delay_ms=1000, retry_on=[429])
cb_client = Chargebee(api_key="api_key", site="site")
cb_client.update_retry_config(retry_config)
# ... your Chargebee API operations ...

Telemetry (OpenTelemetry)

Optional add-on. Existing integrations do not need any changes — if you never set a telemetry adapter, API calls behave exactly as before.

Pass a telemetry_adapter when you want Chargebee API calls traced in your observability stack (Datadog, Splunk, Honeycomb, Jaeger, etc.). OpenTelemetry is not bundled with chargebee — install and configure OTel (or your APM SDK) in your application, implement TelemetryAdapter, and wire it on the client.

The SDK builds standardized span attributes (context.start_attributes, result.end_attributes) following stable OpenTelemetry HTTP semantic conventions (url.full, http.request.method, http.response.status_code, server.address, error.type) plus Chargebee-specific chargebee.* attributes (see chargebee.telemetry.TelemetryAttributeKeys).

Span names follow chargebee.{resource}.{operation} (e.g. chargebee.subscription.create). One span is created per SDK API call; retries reuse the same span. Adapter failures are logged and never affect the underlying API request.

Pass telemetry_adapter when constructing Chargebee, or call update_telemetry_adapter() on an existing client. Each new Chargebee(...) instance gets its own environment — set the adapter on every client you use for telemetry.

To pass custom chargebee-* headers (promoted to http.request.header.chargebee-* span attributes), include them in the headers argument on resource methods.

OpenTelemetry example

pip install chargebee opentelemetry-api opentelemetry-sdk opentelemetry-exporter-otlp-proto-grpc

Configure OpenTelemetry at app startup, then pass your adapter:

# App startup — configure once
from opentelemetry import trace
from opentelemetry.exporter.otlp.proto.grpc.trace_exporter import OTLPSpanExporter
from opentelemetry.sdk.resources import Resource
from opentelemetry.sdk.trace import TracerProvider
from opentelemetry.sdk.trace.export import BatchSpanProcessor
provider = TracerProvider(resource=Resource.create({"service.name": "billing-service"}))
provider.add_span_processor(BatchSpanProcessor(OTLPSpanExporter()))
trace.set_tracer_provider(provider)

from chargebee import (
    Chargebee,
    RequestTelemetryContext,
    RequestTelemetryResult,
    TelemetryAdapter,
)
from opentelemetry import trace
from opentelemetry.trace import SpanKind, Status, StatusCode
class OtelTelemetryAdapter:
    def __init__(self, tracer):
        self._tracer = tracer
    def on_request_start(self, context: RequestTelemetryContext, request_headers: dict):
        span = self._tracer.start_span(
            context.span_name,
            kind=SpanKind.CLIENT,
            attributes=dict(context.start_attributes),
        )
        # Inject W3C trace context into outbound headers
        from opentelemetry.propagate import inject
        from opentelemetry.trace import set_span_in_context
        inject(request_headers, context=set_span_in_context(span))
        return span
    def on_request_end(self, handle, result: RequestTelemetryResult):
        if handle is None:
            return
        span = handle
        for key, value in result.end_attributes.items():
            span.set_attribute(key, value)
        if result.error:
            span.set_status(Status(StatusCode.ERROR, result.error.message))
        else:
            span.set_status(Status(StatusCode.OK))
        span.end()
cb_client = Chargebee(
    api_key="{{api-key}}",
    site="{{site}}",
    telemetry_adapter=OtelTelemetryAdapter(trace.get_tracer("chargebee-python")),
)

Spans are exported by your own OpenTelemetry setup, so they flow to whatever backend you've configured (Datadog, Splunk, Honeycomb, Jaeger, etc.). The Chargebee config above stays the same regardless of backend — refer to your APM vendor's OpenTelemetry/OTLP documentation for exporter endpoints.

Feedback

If you find any bugs or have any feedback, open an issue in this repository or email it to dx@chargebee.com

License

See the LICENSE file.