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: InstantDB
providerId: instantdb
created: '2026-06-20'
modified: '2026-06-20'
reconciled: false
tags:
- Database
- Realtime
- Sync
- Backend
- Local First
- Rate Limiting
- Quotas
- Throttling
description: >-
  InstantDB advertises unlimited API requests on every plan, so the primary
  hard limits are storage-based (1GB Free, 10GB Pro, 250GB Startup) rather
  than per-minute request quotas. Instant operates platform-level abuse and
  fair-use protections on the Admin HTTP API and the realtime sync WebSocket;
  specific numeric throttles are not published. Per-tier and per-endpoint
  values are not reconciled in this artifact.
notes: >-
  Verify any documented per-endpoint or abuse-protection limits and the
  HTTP status returned on throttling against InstantDB docs during
  reconciliation; storage allotments are the main enforced ceilings.
sources:
- https://www.instantdb.com/pricing
- https://www.instantdb.com/docs/http-api
- https://www.instantdb.com/docs
responseCodes:
  throttled: 429
limits:
- name: API Requests
  scope: app
  metric: requests
  limit: unlimited (per published plans)
  notes: All plans advertise unlimited API requests; no per-minute request cap is published.
- name: Database Storage
  scope: app
  metric: storage
  limit: 1GB Free / 10GB Pro / 250GB Startup
  notes: Storage is the primary enforced ceiling; overage billed at $0.125 per GB on paid tiers.
- name: Admin HTTP API
  scope: app
  metric: requests
  limit: see provider documentation
  notes: Fair-use / abuse protections apply to api.instantdb.com; specific numbers not published.
- name: Realtime Sync WebSocket
  scope: app
  metric: connections
  limit: see provider documentation
  notes: Concurrent WebSocket connections to /runtime/session are subject to platform fair-use.
- name: Team Members
  scope: app
  metric: seats
  limit: 1 Free / 10 Pro / unlimited Startup
  notes: Seat limits per app vary by plan.
policies:
- name: Storage-Based Tiers
  description: Ceilings scale with plan storage allotment rather than request-rate quotas.
- name: Backoff Strategy
  description: Clients should implement exponential backoff with jitter and honor Retry-After on 429.
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
  email: kin@apievangelist.com