specification: API Commons Rate Limits
specificationVersion: '0.1'
schema: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/interface-research/main/schema/api-commons.yml#/$defs/RateLimits
provider: Berkshire Hathaway
providerId: berkshire-hathaway
created: '2026-05-04'
modified: '2026-09-19'
generated: '2026-09-19'
method: searched
source: >-
  The 429 response object shared by all eight BNSF Customer API OpenAPI 3.0.0 documents the
  Developer's Console loads (e.g. https://www.bnsf.com/ship-with-bnsf/support-services/customer-api/trace.json,
  components.responses.429), fetched 2026-09-19. The limits below are the provider's own words.
  This REPLACES the 2026-05-04 scaffold, whose free/professional/enterprise tiers were bulk-sweep
  defaults and never published by the provider.
note: >-
  Berkshire Hathaway itself publishes no API. The only API in the group is the BNSF Customer API,
  which is profiled in full under the bnsf record (x-parent: berkshire-hathaway); these are the
  BNSF API Gateway limits, recorded here because the BNSF Railway API entry sits in this record.
  The gateway publishes no rate-limit response headers — the only runtime signal an integrator
  gets is the 429 status itself, and the published guidance is to resubmit failed requests in a
  rate-limited manner.
tags:
  - Conglomerate
  - Freight Rail
  - Rate Limiting
  - Quotas
  - Throttling
description: >-
  Published rate limits of the BNSF Customer API Gateway, as stated in the 429 Too Many Requests
  response of every operation in the eight published OpenAPI documents. Limits are enforced per
  partner (the mTLS certificate holder) per service, and per service across all partners.
headers:
  limit: null
  remaining: null
  reset: null
  retryAfter: null
  policy: null
  note: No X-RateLimit-*, RateLimit-* or Retry-After header is documented; the spec names only the 429 status.
responseCodes:
  throttled: 429
  quotaExceeded: 429
  gatewayTimeout: 504
limit_count: 3
limits:
  - name: Per-partner per-service, per second
    scope: partner-per-service
    metric: requests_per_second
    limit: 1
    timeFrame: second
    verbatim: 1 API Request Per Second, Per Partner, Per Service
    applies:
      - BNSF Railway API
  - name: Per-partner per-service, per minute
    scope: partner-per-service
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 15
    timeFrame: minute
    verbatim: 15 API Requests Per Minute, Per Partner, Per Service
    applies:
      - BNSF Railway API
  - name: Per-service across all partners, per minute
    scope: service
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 100
    timeFrame: minute
    verbatim: 100 API Request Per Minute, Per Service
    applies:
      - BNSF Railway API
policies:
  - name: Throttle Response
    description: >-
      When requests exceed these limits the API Gateway returns a 429 Too Many Requests error
      response. Upon receiving such exceptions, you can resubmit failed requests in a rate-limited
      manner, complying with the API Gateway throttle limits. (verbatim from the 429 response)
  - name: Gateway Timeout
    description: >-
      504 Gateway Timeout — the server is acting as a gateway and cannot get a response in time
      for a request. Wait about one minute then try again. (verbatim from the 504 response)
maintainers:
  - FN: Kin Lane
    email: kin@apievangelist.com