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: ClickSend
providerId: clicksend
created: '2026-07-01'
modified: '2026-07-01'
reconciled: false
tags:
- Communications
- SMS
- MMS
- Voice
- Email
- Post
- Messaging
- Rate Limiting
- Quotas
- Throttling
description: >-
  The ClickSend v3 API applies per-account request throttling to protect the
  platform. Callers should send messages in batches (the send endpoints accept
  a collection of messages in a single request) rather than issuing one HTTP
  request per recipient. Effective throughput is also governed by account credit
  balance, sender/number provisioning, and destination carrier limits rather
  than a single published requests-per-second figure. Specific numeric limits
  are not published as fixed values and are not reconciled in this artifact.
notes: >-
  Prefer batched sends via the messages[] collection on /sms/send, /mms/send,
  and /voice/send to stay within request throttles. Confirm any account-specific
  limits with ClickSend support during reconciliation.
sources:
- https://developers.clicksend.com/
- https://developers.clicksend.com/docs/rest/v3/
responseCodes:
  throttled: 429
limits:
- name: API Requests
  scope: account
  metric: requests
  limit: see provider documentation
  notes: >-
    Per-account request throttling; batch recipients into a single send call
    rather than one request per message.
- name: Batch Size per Send
  scope: request
  metric: messages
  limit: see provider documentation
  notes: >-
    The send endpoints accept a messages[] collection; large batches are the
    intended path for bulk delivery.
- name: Carrier / Destination Throughput
  scope: destination
  metric: messages
  limit: carrier-dependent
  notes: >-
    Downstream SMS/MMS/voice throughput is subject to destination carrier and
    number-type limits.
policies:
- name: Batching
  description: Send multiple recipients per request via the messages[] array to reduce request count.
- name: Backoff Strategy
  description: On HTTP 429, implement exponential backoff with jitter and retry.
- name: Prepaid Balance
  description: Sending stops when account credit is exhausted; monitor balance via GET /account.
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
  email: kin@apievangelist.com