name: Dark Sky FinOps
description: Financial operations guidance for the Dark Sky API (historical; service ended March 31, 2023).
url: https://darksky.net/dev/docs
cost_model:
  type: freemium_pay_as_you_go
  free_units: 1000
  free_unit_type: api_calls_per_day
  paid_unit: api_call
  paid_unit_price: 0.0001
  paid_unit_currency: USD
examples:
  - scenario: Low-traffic personal project
    daily_calls: 500
    monthly_estimate_usd: 0.00
    notes: Stays within the 1,000 free daily calls.
  - scenario: Small application
    daily_calls: 5000
    monthly_estimate_usd: 12.00
    notes: 4,000 paid calls/day × $0.0001 × 30 days = $12.00/month.
  - scenario: Mid-scale application
    daily_calls: 50000
    monthly_estimate_usd: 147.00
    notes: 49,000 paid calls/day × $0.0001 × 30 days = $147.00/month.
  - scenario: High-traffic application
    daily_calls: 500000
    monthly_estimate_usd: 1497.00
    notes: 499,000 paid calls/day × $0.0001 × 30 days = $1,497.00/month.
cost_control:
  - tip: Cache API responses to reduce duplicate calls for the same location and time window.
  - tip: Use the exclude query parameter to omit unneeded data blocks (minutely, hourly, daily, alerts) and reduce payload size.
  - tip: Monitor daily usage via the developer console at darksky.net/dev/console or inspect the X-Forecast-API-Calls response header.
  - tip: Batch locations where possible using the Time Machine endpoint rather than making individual real-time forecast calls.
successor:
  name: Apple WeatherKit
  url: https://developer.apple.com/weatherkit/
  notes: >
    Apple acquired Dark Sky in 2020 and replaced the API with WeatherKit.
    WeatherKit offers 500,000 free API calls per month under the Apple
    Developer Program membership ($99/year).