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: SoundCloud
providerId: soundcloud
created: '2026-05-08'
# Provenance stamped 2026-08-11: this artifact was written by the API Evangelist
# bulk sweep dated 2026-05-08, not harvested from the provider. See roadmap#35.
method: generated
modified: '2026-05-08'
reconciled: true
tags:
- Music
- Streaming
- Audio
- OAuth
- Tracks
- Playlists
- Rate Limiting
- Quotas
- Throttling
description: >-
  SoundCloud applies rate limits on token issuance and on streaming/play counts. Client Credentials
  tokens are limited to 50 tokens per 12 hours per app and 30 tokens per hour per IP. Play count
  limits are 15,000 total plays/24h and 1,000 plays per track/24h. The API returns HTTP 429 with
  X-RateLimit headers.
notes: Play-count-based throttling is unusual; cache stream URLs and tokens accordingly.
sources:
- https://developers.soundcloud.com/docs/api/rate-limits
responseCodes:
  throttled: 429
limits:
- name: Token issuance per app
  scope: application
  metric: tokens
  limit: 50 per 12 hours
  notes: Client Credentials flow.
- name: Token issuance per IP
  scope: ip
  metric: tokens
  limit: 30 per 1 hour
  notes: Token endpoint.
- name: Plays per track
  scope: application
  metric: plays
  limit: 1000 per 24 hours per track
  notes: Per-track stream cap.
- name: Total plays
  scope: application
  metric: plays
  limit: 15000 per 24 hours
  notes: App-wide stream cap.
policies:
- name: Backoff Strategy
  description: On 429, honor X-RateLimit-Reset and apply exponential backoff with jitter.
- name: Token Caching
  description: Cache and reuse tokens; do not re-issue on every call.
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
  email: kin@apievangelist.com