Catenaa, Wednesday, February 18, 2026- Lightning Labs released an open-source toolkit Wednesday enabling AI agents to transact directly on the Bitcoin Lightning Network.
The suite aims to bridge a gap in the emerging AI economy by allowing autonomous systems to send and receive bitcoin payments without identity, API keys, or signup processes.
The toolkit includes seven composable skills covering node operations, remote key isolation, scoped credentials, L402-gated API payments, hosting paid endpoints, and querying node state.
A command-line client, lnget, supports L402-based payment authentication, which repurposes the HTTP 402 “Payment Required” status code to issue Lightning invoices.
Agents can automatically pay and obtain cryptographic proofs to access services, streamlining programmatic microtransactions.
Developers can integrate Aperture, Lightning Labs’ L402-aware reverse proxy, to convert APIs into pay-per-use services, enabling a full machine-payable web loop where agents host and consume services while Lightning settles payments in the background.
The system supports multiple backends, including local gRPC connections, Lightning Node Connect, and an embedded Neutrino light wallet for testing.
Security measures include remote key signing and scoped macaroons with pay-only, invoice-only, and read-only permissions.
The release coincides with broader industry efforts to equip AI agents with financial infrastructure. Coinbase launched “Agentic Wallets” for autonomous wallets with transaction and yield capabilities, while Stripe previewed machine payments using the x402 protocol to charge agents in USDC.
CoinGecko activated x402-powered endpoints priced at 0.01 USDC per request. Lightning Labs’ toolkit positions the Bitcoin Lightning Network as a native rail for autonomous agent commerce, supporting scalable, low-value transactions for AI applications.
