Free $300 Google Cloud Credit: Every Google AI Model, Plus a Skill That Sets It All Up

Did you know Google gives you $300 to spend on its cloud, and that you can use it for Google's language models and to create videos, images, voiceovers and music with AI? Here is how to get the credit, plus a free Claude Code skill that does the whole setup for you.

What you get

A new Google Cloud account gets $300 in credit for 90 days. The credit gives you direct access to Google's models on Vertex AI. Every model below was tested with a real API call in October 2026:

Gemini 4: Google's most capable language model, for writing, code and document analysis
Gemini 3.8 Flash: fast and cheap, for everyday tasks
Gemini Transcribe: turns recordings into text
Veo 3.1: realistic video clips from a text description
Gemini 3.8 TTS: natural-sounding voiceover
Lyria 3 Pro: original background music from a description
Nano Banana 2.1: images, banners and thumbnails

Together they cover a whole video from one account: Gemini writes the script, Veo shoots it, TTS narrates and Lyria scores it.

How to get the $300

Go to console.cloud.google.com/freetrial with a Google account that has never had a Google Cloud account. Google asks for credit card details, and the $300 credit for three months starts right away.

The card is only for verification. You are not charged unless you choose to upgrade to a paid account. When the credit runs out or 90 days pass, services simply stop.

Note: the credit does not cover partner models such as Claude, or the Gemini API through AI Studio. It covers Google's own models on Vertex AI.

The skill: the whole setup, automated

After signup comes the tedious part: a project, billing link, APIs, a service account, permissions, a key and environment variables. The skill does all of it through the gcloud CLI and stops only for the steps you have to do yourself.

Download the skill: gcp-vertex-setup.zip

What the skill does for you

Installs the gcloud CLI if it is missing
Creates a project and links it to your Free Trial billing account
Enables Vertex AI and the other required APIs
Creates a service account with the aiplatform.user role and a JSON key
Sets permanent environment variables, so any Python script connects without logging in again
Creates a $300 budget with email alerts at 50%, 90% and 100%
Checks everything works with a real Gemini call, and shows the newest models available to you

What you do by hand

Enter the card details and accept the terms at signup
Sign in to your Google account in the browser, once
On a Google Workspace organization account, an org admin may need to allow key creation. The skill prints the exact command

Install

Download the file and extract it into %USERPROFILE%\.claude\skills\ (Mac: ~/.claude/skills/)
Open Claude Code and type: Set up Vertex AI with the $300 Google Cloud credit
The skill asks a few questions and walks you through the manual steps

The setup script is written for Windows PowerShell. On Mac and Linux, Claude runs the same gcloud commands directly.

Security

The JSON key the skill creates is worth money. Never upload it to GitHub, Drive or a chat. If it leaks, delete it in IAM right away and create a new one.