If you have an Area Under Management (AUM) subscription and your usage jumped well past the area you expected, the most common cause is ordering full PlanetScope scenes through the Orders API without the clip tool. This article explains why that happens and how to keep usage within your area of interest (AOI).

How AUM quota is consumed

An AUM subscription gives you access to archive and new PlanetScope imagery over the areas you manage, measured in square kilometers. Quota is consumed by the area of the imagery you order and deliver, not by the size of the AOI you intend to cover. When you order an item without clipping it, the full footprint of that scene counts against your quota.

A single PlanetScope scene covers a large area. A SuperDove scene, for example, is roughly 32.5 km by 19.6 km, or about 637 square kilometers. Ordering five unclipped scenes can therefore consume several thousand square kilometers, even when the AOI is only a fraction of one scene. This is how a small AOI can show usage far above 100 percent.

Why an unclipped order counts the whole scene

The Orders API delivers complete scenes by default. The clip tool is what restricts delivery, and quota consumption, to your AOI. If you submit a PlanetScope (PSScene) order without including the clip tool, each item is delivered at its full footprint and the full footprint is charged.

Clipping to your AOI counts only the clipped area against quota. For details on how each tool affects consumption, see the related articles below.

How to keep usage within your AOI

1. Include the clip tool in every order, with your AOI geometry as the clip geometry. This restricts both delivery and quota consumption to your AOI.
2. Estimate consumption before you order. The Quota Reservations API can preview how much quota an order will use before you commit to it.
3. Use the Subscriptions API for recurring AOI-managed delivery. A subscription tied to your AOI delivers ongoing imagery clipped to that area, which is a good fit for monitoring workflows.
4. Deliver clipped outputs to your destination of choice. Clipped imagery can be delivered to cloud destinations, including Google Earth Engine, the same way full-scene orders are.

If you have already exceeded your quota

If an unintended full-scene order has consumed your quota, pause further ordering and contact Planet Support. Include your subscription ID, the order ID, and the item IDs so the team can review what was delivered. Quota adjustments are handled case by case and are not guaranteed, so the most reliable safeguard is to clip every order from the start.

Reference documentation

For the technical detail behind this summary, see the Planet documentation:

• Orders API tools for the clip tool and how to add it to an order.
• Quota Reservations API for estimating and reserving quota before you order.
• Orders API mechanics for how orders are built and delivered.