BerriAI/litellm · error · ValueError

api_key is required (set RAGFLOW_API_KEY env var or pass in

Error message

api_key is required (set RAGFLOW_API_KEY env var or pass in litellm_params)

What it means

Credential guard in the RAGFlow vector-store get_auth_credentials: neither litellm_params['api_key'] nor the RAGFLOW_API_KEY secret is set, so the Bearer credential for the RAGFlow datasets API cannot be obtained.

Source

Thrown at litellm/llms/ragflow/vector_stores/transformation.py:33

    VectorStoreSearchResponse,
)

if TYPE_CHECKING:
    from litellm.litellm_core_utils.litellm_logging import Logging as LiteLLMLoggingObj
else:
    LiteLLMLoggingObj = Any


class RAGFlowVectorStoreConfig(BaseVectorStoreConfig):
    """Vector store configuration for RAGFlow datasets."""

    def get_auth_credentials(self, litellm_params: dict) -> BaseVectorStoreAuthCredentials:
        api_key = litellm_params.get("api_key")
        if api_key is None:
            # Try to get from environment variable
            api_key = get_secret_str("RAGFLOW_API_KEY")
        if api_key is None:
            raise ValueError("api_key is required (set RAGFLOW_API_KEY env var or pass in litellm_params)")
        return {
            "headers": {
                "Authorization": f"Bearer {api_key}",
            },
        }

    def get_vector_store_endpoints_by_type(self) -> VectorStoreIndexEndpoints:
        """RAGFlow vector stores are management-only, no search support."""
        return {
            "read": [],
            "write": [],
        }

    def validate_environment(self, headers: dict, litellm_params: GenericLiteLLMParams | None) -> dict:
        """Validate environment and set headers for RAGFlow API."""
        litellm_params = litellm_params or GenericLiteLLMParams()
        api_key: Final = litellm_params.api_key or get_secret_str("RAGFLOW_API_KEY")

View on GitHub (pinned to 77b7c6c40c)

Solutions

1. Set the RAGFLOW_API_KEY environment variable.
2. Or pass api_key in litellm_params for the vector store call.

Example fix

os.environ["RAGFLOW_API_KEY"] = "ragflow-<key>"

When it happens

Trigger: Triggered when calling RAGFlow vector stores without an API key: RAGFLOW_API_KEY env var unset and no api_key in litellm_params.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

AI-assisted analysis of BerriAI/litellm@77b7c6c40c (2026-08-18). Data as JSON: /api/errors/c3e1fd47def6f3da. Report an issue: GitHub.