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: Google Cloud Platform
providerId: google-cloud-platform
created: '2026-05-04'
# Provenance stamped 2026-08-11: this artifact was written by the API Evangelist
# bulk sweep dated 2026-05-04, not harvested from the provider. See roadmap#35.
method: generated
modified: '2026-05-05'
reconciled: true
tags:
  - Cloud Platform
  - Multi-Product
  - Google Cloud
  - Rate Limiting
description: Google Cloud rate limits and quotas are scoped per-API and per-project. Each Cloud service
  has its own quota policy on its `Quotas` page; cross-cutting limits also apply at the Cloud Resource
  Manager and IAM control plane. Quotas are typically soft and raisable through the Cloud Console quotas
  page with a 1-3 day review cadence. Numbers below are platform-wide patterns; consult per-service quota
  pages for exact values.
sources:
  - https://cloud.google.com/docs/quotas
  - https://cloud.google.com/api-keys/docs/quotas
  - https://cloud.google.com/service-usage/docs/quotas
responseCodes:
  throttled: 429
  quotaExceeded: 403
  serverError: 500
limits:
  - name: Per-service per-project quotas
    scope: project/service
    metric: varies
    limit: see per-service quotas page
    notes: Each Cloud service publishes its own quotas; default values typically scale to standard production
      use and can be raised.
  - name: Default API key request rate
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_second
    limit: see api-key quotas
    notes: Standard API key quotas (e.g., 10,000 requests/100 seconds for many APIs). Override via the
      Cloud Console.
  - name: Cloud Resource Manager API
    scope: project
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 600
    timeFrame: minute
  - name: IAM read requests
    scope: project
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 6000
    timeFrame: minute
  - name: IAM write requests
    scope: project
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 60
    timeFrame: minute
  - name: Service Usage management
    scope: project
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 600
    timeFrame: minute
  - name: Compute Engine API requests
    scope: project
    metric: requests_per_100_seconds
    limit: 1500
    notes: Default quota for the Compute Engine API; raisable.
policies:
  - name: Per-service quotas
    description: Each Cloud service exposes its own quotas under Cloud Console > IAM & Admin > Quotas.
      The platform-level umbrella here is for orientation; always confirm against the per-service docs.
  - name: Quota raises
    description: Most quotas are soft. Submit a quota increase request via the Cloud Console; production
      raises typically resolve within 1-3 business days.
  - name: Backoff and retry
    description: Implement exponential backoff with jitter on 429 / 403 quotaExceeded; respect Retry-After
      headers and propagate idempotency keys where supported (e.g., requestId for Compute, ETags for resource
      mutations).
  - name: Project-scoped isolation
    description: Quotas are enforced per-project (and sometimes per-region or per-zone) by default; spread
      workloads across projects to scale beyond a single quota.
  - name: SLA-backed rate limiting
    description: Some services (Spanner, Bigtable, Pub/Sub) use capacity-based throttling rather than
      hard quotas; provision capacity to absorb traffic.
maintainers:
  - FN: Kin Lane
    email: kin@apievangelist.com