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: PDF.co
providerId: pdf-co
created: '2026-05-25'
modified: '2026-05-25'
reconciled: true
tags:
  - PDF
  - Quotas
  - Credits
  - Rate Limiting
description: Reconciled rate limits and quota policies for the PDF.co Web API. PDF.co enforces a credit-based
  monthly quota rather than a public per-second RPS ceiling; concurrency limits scale with plan tier and
  large/long-running operations should use async mode with /v1/job/check polling.
sources:
  - https://pdf.co/pricing
  - https://docs.pdf.co
  - https://docs.pdf.co/glossary/webhook-and-callbacks
responseCodes:
  throttled: 429
  quotaExceeded: 402
algorithm: credit-quota
primaryMeter: credits
secondaryMeter: concurrent-requests
quotas:
  - plan: Free Trial
    creditsPerMonth: 10000
    duration: 1 month
  - plan: Basic
    creditsPerMonth: 16500
  - plan: Personal
    creditsPerMonth: 37000
  - plan: Business 1
    creditsPerMonth: 80500
  - plan: Business 2
    creditsPerMonth: 159850
  - plan: Business 3
    creditsPerMonth: 483000
  - plan: Enterprise
    creditsPerMonth: "500000+"
asyncPattern:
  description: "Long-running operations (large PDFs, OCR, complex parsing) should set async to true. The initial response returns a jobId; clients poll /v1/job/check or rely on the optional callback webhook URL to receive completion notifications."
  pollEndpoint: /v1/job/check
  callbackField: callback
fileLimits:
  - name: Sync file upload (multipart)
    limit: 100 KB
    endpoint: /v1/file/upload
    note: Use /v1/file/upload/url or /v1/file/upload/get-presigned-url for larger files.
  - name: Presigned upload
    limit: Effectively unlimited for the storage tier; configure via /v1/file/upload/get-presigned-url.
outputLinkExpiry:
  - plan: Free Trial, Basic, Personal, Business 1
    minutes: 60
  - plan: Business 2, Business 3, Enterprise
    minutes: 1440
policies:
  - name: Credit-based metering
    description: Each endpoint consumes a documented credit cost depending on operation type, file size,
      page count, and OCR/AI usage. Track usage via /v1/account/credit/balance.
  - name: Monthly quota reset
    description: Credits reset at the start of each billing cycle and do not roll over.
  - name: Async-first for heavy ops
    description: "Run AI Invoice Parser, OCR, classifier, large conversions, and multi-page operations with async=true to avoid request timeouts."
  - name: Webhook callbacks
    description: Provide a `callback` URL on async requests to receive job-completion notifications instead
      of polling.
  - name: HTTPS-only
    description: All requests must use HTTPS; the x-api-key header must accompany every call.