Rate limits and quota

The API is free for the first year: there are no plan tiers, invoices or payments. Still, every keyed request is counted and limited against abuse. Limits are per product.

Products and limits

These are the values of a standard key; the minute and day windows are fixed UTC windows (reset at the start of the minute and at UTC midnight). Each key also has a monthly quota across all products (UTC month), given to you with the key. Write to the administrator if you need higher limits.

The 429 response

When a limit is reached the API answers 429 with the usual error body (Errors):

{"code": "rate_limited", "detail": "rate limit of 60 per minute reached"}

Refused requests are not counted, nor are 401 and 403. Invalid requests (422) are counted.

What a client should do

• On 429 wait Retry-After seconds; do not repeat the request at once.
• Keep read responses with their ETag: ask the same query with If-None-Match and you get 304 (no body, cheap) when nothing changed.
• If you see 429 all the time, review your request pattern or ask the administrator for higher limits.

// A simple client that honours Retry-After (Node 24 or browser fetch).
export async function updraftGet(url, apiKey, { attempts = 3 } = {}) {
  for (let attempt = 1; ; attempt += 1) {
    const response = await fetch(url, { headers: { 'X-Api-Key': apiKey } });
    if (response.status !== 429 && response.status < 500) return response;
    if (attempt >= attempts) return response;
    const wait = Number(response.headers.get('Retry-After') ?? 2 ** attempt);
    await new Promise((resolve) => setTimeout(resolve, wait * 1000));
  }
}

Limits on tiles

Keyed tile requests fall under the tiles limits above and are counted for you. Tile requests without a key are guarded by a coarse limit per client address (a plain 429 without a body) and are not counted. Details: Tiles and styles.