Frequently Asked Questions

Find answers to common questions about Apogee.

Apogee is a policy intelligence platform. It connects data from Congress.gov, the Federal Register, FEC filings, lobbying disclosures, CRS reports, and 40+ news outlets to the AI tools you already use. Instead of logging into a separate dashboard, you ask questions in natural language and get sourced, synthesized answers.

How is Apogee different from Quorum, FiscalNote, or Bloomberg Government?

Traditional platforms organize data into dashboards that you search and filter manually. Apogee works differently in three ways: (1) it's conversational, so you ask questions in plain language instead of constructing boolean queries; (2) it's built on a knowledge graph with 200K+ entities, enabling analytics like influence ranking, voting bloc detection, and coalition prediction that flat databases can't match; and (3) it connects to your existing AI assistant via MCP, so there's no new software to learn. See the detailed comparisons for more.

What can I actually do with Apogee?

Apogee has 50+ intelligence capabilities across 9 categories. Examples of what users ask:

"What bills were introduced about AI regulation this week and who sponsored them?"
"Which PACs are funding members on the Energy and Commerce Committee, and how does that correlate with their votes?"
"Track the lobbying activity around the CHIPS Act - who's spending, how much, and which firms are they using?"
"Find hearing testimony about drug pricing from the last 6 months and summarize the key positions"
"Who are the most likely cosponsors for this climate bill based on voting patterns and committee membership?"

See Intelligence Capabilities for the full list.

What is MCP?

The Model Context Protocol is an open standard that allows AI assistants to securely connect to external data sources. Apogee publishes its intelligence capabilities as an MCP endpoint that any compatible AI assistant can use. Learn more at modelcontextprotocol.io.

Which AI assistants work with Apogee?

Any MCP-compatible AI assistant, including:

Claude Desktop and Claude.ai (native MCP support)
ChatGPT (via MCP plugins)
Cursor, Windsurf, and other MCP-enabled developer tools
Custom applications using MCP SDKs

You can also skip MCP entirely and use the Apogee chat client with everything pre-configured.

Intelligence Capabilities

How does the AI research agent work?

When you ask a question, an AI research agent analyzes your query, selects the right capabilities (bill search, graph analytics, news monitoring, etc.), queries across data sources, and returns synthesized intelligence with citations. You don't need to know which tool to use - the agent figures that out.

What is the knowledge graph?

The knowledge graph is a network of 200K+ entities (members of Congress, bills, committees, PACs, lobbying firms, news articles, organizations) connected by millions of relationships. It powers the most distinctive Apogee capabilities: influence ranking, voting bloc detection, alliance prediction, coalition building, PAC network clustering, revolving door tracking, and funding anomaly detection. These analytics aren't possible with traditional flat databases.

Can Apogee track lobbying activity?

Yes. Apogee ingests lobbying disclosures from the Senate Office of Public Records (SOPR) and connects them to the knowledge graph. You can track which organizations are lobbying on specific bills, how much they're spending, which firms they've hired, and which members they're targeting. The Money & Influence Intelligence capabilities also detect funding anomalies and map PAC-to-member contribution networks.

Can I track a bill's full lifecycle?

Yes. Apogee tracks bills from introduction through enactment, including sponsor/cosponsor data, committee referrals, amendments, floor votes, and conference actions. The bill momentum scoring capability predicts a bill's likelihood of advancement based on historical patterns, and cosponsor prediction identifies the most likely next cosponsors using graph analytics.

Does Apogee cover hearing transcripts?

Yes. Full-text search across thousands of congressional hearing transcripts with AI-generated summaries, witness testimony extraction, and entity linking. See Committee & Hearing Intelligence.

Data & Coverage

How current is the data?

Legislation: Daily from Congress.gov (updated each day as official actions post)
Hearings: Transcripts indexed as published by the Government Publishing Office
Regulations: Daily from the Federal Register
Lobbying: Filed quarterly with the Senate Office of Public Records; new filings are ingested as they post
Campaign finance: Weekly from the Federal Election Commission
News: Continuously monitored across 40+ policy outlets
Knowledge graph: Relationships and analytics refresh hourly; analytics scores every 6 hours

How far back does historical data go?

Legislation: 93rd Congress (1973) to present
State legislation (MA): 193rd-194th sessions (2023 to present)
Regulations: 1994 to present
CRS Reports: 2018 to present
News: 90-day rolling window
Campaign finance: Current election cycle
Lobbying: Current filing period

Does Apogee cover state legislatures?

Staff directories: Yes, across all 50 states and DC. Search state legislative staff by name, office, role, or policy area, with contact information and social media where published. Licensed staff records are available to authenticated users only.

Bills and legislators: Yes, for all 50 states plus DC - bills, legislators, and sponsorships are searchable in chat. Massachusetts is the deepest as of May 2026, with roll-call votes from the 193rd and 194th sessions, live bill text, and committee detail. See Data Sources for the full coverage table.

Where does the data come from?

All data is sourced from authoritative government and policy sources: Congress.gov, the Government Publishing Office, the Federal Register, the Federal Election Commission, the Senate Office of Public Records, the Congressional Research Service, and 40+ established news organizations. See Data Sources for the complete list.

Account & Pricing

How much does Apogee cost?

Apogee is free to start, with no sales calls or contracts. Starter is $50/month, the full Pro platform starts at $150/month with the rate set automatically by organization type (nonprofit, government, or commercial) from your email domain, and Teams & Enterprise is custom. All plans include all 50+ intelligence capabilities and all data sources; tiers differ by monthly credit allowance and team features. See pricing for current plans and How Usage & Credits Work for how metering works.

How does usage metering work?

Apogee uses cost-based metering rather than fixed request limits. Each query's cost depends on the AI model used and the complexity of the research - simple lookups cost less, multi-source synthesis costs more. Your plan includes a monthly credit allowance that resets each billing cycle, plus a $50 signup bonus that never expires. See How Usage & Credits Work for a detailed explanation.

Can I try Apogee before paying?

Yes. Every new account starts with a $50 signup bonus that never expires - enough to run real research across all capabilities and data sources before choosing a plan. No credit card required.

Can I cancel my subscription?

Yes, you can cancel anytime from the Billing page. Your access continues until the end of your billing period.

Setup & Technical

How do I get started?

Two options:

Fastest: Go to chat.apog.ai and start asking questions immediately. No setup required.
Connect your own AI: Add the Apogee MCP endpoint to Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor, or any MCP client. Takes about 5 minutes. See the Getting Started guide.

Where do I find my API key?

API keys are available on the Connect page. Click "Generate New Key" to create one.

My API key isn't working. What should I check?

Verify the key starts with apk_
Check for extra spaces or line breaks when pasting
Ensure the key is active on the Connect page
Verify your subscription is current

Can I use Apogee without connecting an AI assistant?

Yes. The Apogee chat client provides a hosted conversation interface with all capabilities pre-configured. No API key or MCP setup required - just sign in and start asking questions.

Privacy & Security

How is my data handled?

Conversations are stored so Apogee can keep your history, generate briefings, and personalize what it surfaces. That content is never sold and never used to train foundation AI models. It is shared only with the service providers that operate the platform, and a conversation is reviewed only to diagnose a failure. See the Privacy Policy for the full detail.

Is my API key secure?

API keys are hashed using SHA-256 before storage. The full API key is never stored or logged. If you suspect a key is compromised, revoke it immediately from the Connect page.

Where are your servers located?

Apogee infrastructure is hosted in AWS US-East-1 (Virginia). All data is encrypted in transit (TLS 1.2+) and at rest (AES-256).

AI & Models

Which AI models does Apogee use?

Apogee runs primarily on Anthropic's Claude models. Claude is the default for policy work for four reasons:

Citation discipline. Claude is more conservative about quoting statutory text, section numbers, and source material it can't verify. For policy work, a fabricated cite is a career-level problem. Claude is more likely to say "this isn't in the source" than to invent something that sounds right.

Long-context behavior. Full bill text, CRS reports, and hearing transcripts add up fast. Claude holds the thread better across long conversations and dense cross-document analysis, continuing to use earlier context accurately even when the window is heavily loaded.

Data handling. Anthropic does not train on data sent through their API. Combined with the data controls Apogee applies, your queries and documents stay yours. This matters for government affairs teams handling sensitive client work and for Hill staff handling pre-decisional material.

Reasoning posture. Claude's default tone reads as analyst-style and hedged rather than confidently assertive. For policy synthesis, "here's what the record shows, here's what's ambiguous" is more useful than a punchy take.

Do you use other models for anything?

Yes, where they're a better fit for the specific task. Smaller, faster models handle classification, tagging, and structured extraction where the work is deterministic and doesn't require deep reasoning. The user-facing chat and research synthesis run on Claude.

Verify your API key is correct and starts with apk_
Check that the MCP configuration file is in the right location for your assistant
Completely restart the assistant application (MCP connections are established at startup)

I'm seeing "Limit reached" in the chat client

You've used your plan's credit allowance for the current billing cycle. Options:

Upgrade - visit the Billing page for a higher-allowance plan
Wait for the reset - your allowance refreshes at the start of your next billing cycle
Optimize - use specific questions for simple lookups. See usage tips

Results seem incomplete or off-topic

Be specific: "bills introduced in the 119th Congress about AI regulation" works better than "AI bills"
Mention the data type you want: "search news about..." vs "search bills about..."
For complex research, break it into focused questions rather than one broad query
Check Intelligence Capabilities for examples of what each category can do

Contact Support

Still have questions? Contact us through the contact form, or ask in the chat client if you're a current user.

Response time: Within 1 business day for Pro and Teams & Enterprise customers

Ready to get started? Connect your AI assistant or try the Apogee chat client.