---
title: Applying Rate Limits
framework: Apple Ads Platform API
role: article
role_heading: Article
platforms: [apple ads platform api 1.0+]
path: apple-ads-platform-api/rate-limits
---

# Applying Rate Limits

Track your remaining quota and pace requests.

## Overview

Overview Rate limits exist in the Apple Ads Platform API to avoid latency and other system problems from too many API calls within a limited time. Every response, successful or not, includes a set of rate-limit headers based on the IETF RateLimit header fields draft, and reports your remaining request quota so your client can pace requests and back off before hitting a 429 rate limit. Read the Rate Limit Headers The following table details the three header types:  |  |   |  |   |  |   |  |  A response looks like the following: HTTP/1.1 200 OK RateLimit-Limit: 100 RateLimit-Remaining: 4 RateLimit-Reset: 37 When the server rejects a request with 429 / rate_limit_exceeded, the response also includes a Retry-After header, giving the number of seconds to wait before the server accepts the next request. Prefer Retry-After over RateLimit-Reset when both are present on a 429 response because it reflects the exact wait for that rejected request. Implement Rate Limit Handling in a Custom Client If you call the API directly (rather than through a generated SDK), read the rate-limit headers off every HTTP response your client receives and use them to pace requests. Apply the following pacing rules: Before issuing your next request, check RateLimit-Remaining. If it’s low, wait roughly RateLimit-Reset seconds so the window has a chance to refresh, instead of waiting for a 429. If a request fails with 429, wait the number of seconds that Retry-After specifies (falling back to RateLimit-Reset, then to a default) before retrying. Double the wait on each consecutive 429, up to a maximum backoff, such as 16 seconds. After reaching the maximum, don’t increase the wait period between retries. Reset your backoff counter back to the minimum wait once a request succeeds. The following example applies to any custom HTTP client: Read the three headers off the response, throttle proactively, and back off on 429. import time import requests

def call_with_backoff(method, url, max_retries=5, max_backoff=16, **kwargs):     """Issue an HTTP request against the Apple Ads Platform API, pacing     requests using the RateLimit-* / Retry-After response headers."""     wait = 2     for attempt in range(max_retries):         response = requests.request(method, url, **kwargs)         headers = response.headers

if response.status_code == 429:             retry_after = headers.get("Retry-After") or headers.get("RateLimit-Reset")             time.sleep(float(retry_after) if retry_after is not None else wait)             wait = min(wait * 2, max_backoff)             continue

remaining = headers.get("RateLimit-Remaining")         reset = headers.get("RateLimit-Reset")         if remaining is not None and reset is not None and int(remaining) < 5:             time.sleep(int(reset))

return response

raise RuntimeError(f"Exceeded {max_retries} retries due to rate limiting")

response = call_with_backoff(     "GET",     "https://api.ads.apple.com/v1/campaigns/542317095",     headers={         "Authorization": "Bearer {access_token}",         "X-AP-Context": "adAccountId={adAccountId}",     }, ) Implement Rate Limit Handling in a Generated Client If you use a generated client instead, every method has a _with_http_info counterpart that returns a (data, status_code, headers) tuple giving you the same access to the rate-limit headers. The logic above applies unchanged. Just read headers.get(...) from that tuple rather than from a requests.Response, as shown here: data, status, headers = client.campaigns_id_get_with_http_info(ctx, campaign_id) print(headers.get("RateLimit-Remaining")) print(headers.get("RateLimit-Reset")) Apply the same header-aware backoff strategy for every endpoint that returns a 429, regardless of which HTTP client or SDK you use. For the full request and response structure reference, see Calling the Apple Ads Platform API.

## See Also

### Essentials

- [Implementing OAuth for the Apple Ads Platform API](apple-ads-platform-api/implementing-oauth-for-the-apple-ads-platform-api.md)
- [Calling the Apple Ads Platform API](apple-ads-platform-api/calling-apple-ads-platform-api.md)
- [Using Client Libraries](apple-ads-platform-api/client-libraries.md)
- [Advertising Your App on the App Store](apple-ads-platform-api/journey-app-store-ads.md)
- [Advertising Your Business on Apple Maps](apple-ads-platform-api/journey-apple-maps-brand-ads.md)