Rate Limits & Quotas

SnowScrape enforces rate limits to ensure fair usage and platform stability. Understanding these limits helps you design applications that work reliably.

API Rate Limits

Rate Limit Headers

Every API response includes headers to help you track your usage:

X-RateLimit-Limit: 60
X-RateLimit-Remaining: 45
X-RateLimit-Reset: 1705766400

Handling Rate Limits

When you exceed the rate limit, the API returns a 429 Too Many Requests response:

HTTP/1.1 429 Too Many Requests
Retry-After: 60

{
  "error": "rate_limited",
  "message": "API rate limit exceeded. Please retry after 60 seconds.",
  "retry_after": 60
}

Retry with Exponential Backoff

async function requestWithRetry(url, options, maxRetries = 3) {
  for (let attempt = 0; attempt < maxRetries; attempt++) {
    const response = await fetch(url, options);

    if (response.status === 429) {
      const retryAfter = response.headers.get('Retry-After') || 60;
      const delay = Math.min(retryAfter * 1000, Math.pow(2, attempt) * 1000);

      console.log(`Rate limited. Retrying in ${delay}ms...`);
      await new Promise(resolve => setTimeout(resolve, delay));
      continue;
    }

    return response;
  }

  throw new Error('Max retries exceeded');
}

Scraping Rate Limits

In addition to API limits, job execution has separate rate controls:

Usage Quotas

Best Practices

• Batch operations - Create multiple jobs in one request when possible
• Use webhooks - Instead of polling for job status, use webhooks
• Cache responses - Store results locally to avoid re-downloading
• Monitor usage - Track rate limit headers to avoid hitting limits
• Implement backoff - Always handle 429 responses gracefully

Next Steps