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: OpenWeatherMap
providerId: openweathermap
created: '2026-05-29'
modified: '2026-05-29'
tags:
  - Weather
  - Forecast
  - Air Pollution
  - Rate Limiting
  - Quotas
  - Throttling
description: Rate limit definitions for the OpenWeather API surface across all subscription tiers. Captures per-minute call ceilings, per-month quotas, response signaling, and recovery semantics.
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: free
    name: Free Per-Minute
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 60
    timeFrame: minute
    applies:
      - Current Weather Data API
      - 5-day / 3-hour Forecast API
      - 16-day Daily Forecast API
      - Air Pollution API
      - Geocoding API
      - Weather Maps 1.0
  - tier: free
    name: Free Monthly Quota
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_month
    limit: 1000000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - Current Weather Data API
      - 5-day / 3-hour Forecast API
      - 16-day Daily Forecast API
      - Air Pollution API
      - Geocoding API
      - Weather Maps 1.0
  - tier: startup
    name: Startup Per-Minute
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 600
    timeFrame: minute
    applies:
      - All Free Tier APIs
  - tier: startup
    name: Startup Monthly Quota
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_month
    limit: 10000000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - All Free Tier APIs
  - tier: developer
    name: Developer Per-Minute
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 3000
    timeFrame: minute
    applies:
      - All Startup Tier APIs
      - Hourly Forecast 4 Days
      - Climatic Forecast 30 Days
      - Weather Maps 2.0 (3h)
  - tier: developer
    name: Developer Monthly Quota
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_month
    limit: 100000000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - All Developer Tier APIs
  - tier: professional
    name: Professional Per-Minute
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 30000
    timeFrame: minute
    applies:
      - All Developer Tier APIs
      - Historical Weather API
      - Bulk Current Data
      - Accumulated Parameters
      - Global Precipitation Maps (Historical)
  - tier: professional
    name: Professional Monthly Quota
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_month
    limit: 1000000000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - All Professional Tier APIs
  - tier: expert
    name: Expert Per-Minute
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: 100000
    timeFrame: minute
    applies:
      - All Professional Tier APIs
      - Statistical Weather Data API
      - Road Risk API
      - Solar Irradiance API
  - tier: expert
    name: Expert Monthly Quota
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_month
    limit: 3000000000
    timeFrame: month
    applies:
      - All Expert Tier APIs
  - tier: one-call-payg
    name: One Call 4.0 Free Daily Allotment
    scope: api-key
    metric: requests_per_day
    limit: 1000
    timeFrame: day
    applies:
      - One Call API 4.0
  - tier: enterprise
    name: Enterprise Negotiated Limit
    scope: contract
    metric: requests_per_minute
    limit: -1
    timeFrame: minute
    applies:
      - All OpenWeather APIs
policies:
  - name: Backoff Strategy
    description: Clients should implement exponential backoff with jitter and honor the Retry-After header.
  - name: Quota Reset
    description: Monthly quotas reset at the start of each calendar month in UTC. Per-minute windows reset on a sliding-window basis.
  - name: One Call Daily Window
    description: One Call 4.0 daily counter resets at 00:00 UTC; calls in excess of 1,000 per day are billed at the published per-call price.
  - name: Tier Switching
    description: Plan changes take effect at the start of the next billing cycle unless explicitly accelerated by OpenWeather support.
  - name: Fair Use
    description: Even on uncapped enterprise contracts, sustained traffic that materially impacts shared infrastructure may be subject to fair-use throttling.
maintainers:
  - FN: Kin Lane
    email: kin@apievangelist.com