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: Bright Data
providerId: bright-data
created: '2026-05-25'
modified: '2026-05-25'
tags:
  - Rate Limiting
  - Quotas
  - Bright Data
description: |
  Rate-limit posture for the Bright Data API surface. Bright Data primarily controls usage via per-zone
  concurrency caps and monthly result/bandwidth quotas tied to the customer's plan. Hard per-second
  request limits are documented per product; see https://docs.brightdata.com for the authoritative limits.
headers:
  limit: X-RateLimit-Limit
  remaining: X-RateLimit-Remaining
  reset: X-RateLimit-Reset
  retryAfter: Retry-After
responseCodes:
  throttled: 429
  quotaExceeded: 429
  serviceUnavailable: 503
limits:
  - tier: payg
    name: Pay As You Go — Default Concurrency
    scope: zone
    metric: concurrent_requests
    limit: 100
    timeFrame: instantaneous
    applies:
      - Bright Data Web Unlocker API
      - Bright Data SERP API
      - Bright Data Web Scraper API
    notes: |
      Bright Data advertises "unlimited concurrent requests" on PAYG and self-serve tiers. The
      effective ceiling is governed by your zone configuration and account-level fairness; contact
      support to raise concurrency for sustained spikes.
  - tier: growth
    name: Growth — Monthly Result Quota
    scope: zone
    metric: results
    limit: 380000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - Bright Data Web Unlocker API
      - Bright Data SERP API
  - tier: business
    name: Business — Monthly Result Quota
    scope: zone
    metric: results
    limit: 900000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - Bright Data Web Unlocker API
  - tier: premium
    name: Premium — Monthly Result Quota
    scope: zone
    metric: results
    limit: 2000000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - Bright Data Web Unlocker API
  - tier: web-scraper-scale
    name: Web Scraper API — Scale
    scope: account
    metric: records
    limit: 384000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - Bright Data Web Scraper API
  - tier: residential-growth
    name: Residential Proxies — Growth Bandwidth Cap
    scope: zone
    metric: gigabytes
    limit: 141
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - Bright Data Residential Proxies
  - tier: scraping-browser
    name: Scraping Browser — Concurrent Sessions
    scope: account
    metric: concurrent_sessions
    limit: 50
    timeFrame: instantaneous
    applies:
      - Bright Data Scraping Browser API
    notes: |
      Per-account session concurrency is configurable; defaults to a small value for new accounts and
      scales upward on request.
  - tier: mcp-hosted-free
    name: Hosted MCP Server — Free Tier
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests
    limit: 5000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - Bright Data MCP Server
recovery:
  - condition: 429 Too Many Requests
    behavior: |
      Bright Data returns 429 when zone concurrency or monthly quota is exceeded. Clients should
      back off using exponential delay, honor `Retry-After` when present, and route to an alternate
      zone for sustained load.
  - condition: 503 Service Unavailable
    behavior: |
      Transient upstream issues; retry with exponential backoff. Persistent 503s should be reported
      via support with the response_id or snapshot_id.
sources:
  - https://docs.brightdata.com
  - https://brightdata.com/pricing/web-unlocker
  - https://brightdata.com/pricing/web-scraper