429 Too Many Requests
Web/HTTP
Medium severity
HTTP 429 — Too Many Requests
You’ve exceeded the allowed request rate. The response usually includes a Retry-After header telling you when to try again.
Last reviewed 2026-08-29 by the Tech Issue Guide team.
Symptoms
- An API or site returns “429 Too Many Requests” during a burst of activity.
- A script that loops over many items fails partway through.
- The response includes a Retry-After header with seconds or a date.
What causes 429 Too Many Requests
- Your client sent more requests than the per-minute/hour quota allows.
- No backoff logic, so failed calls are retried immediately and make it worse.
- Shared IP or API key — someone else’s traffic counts against the same limit.
- A bot-protection rule treating rapid requests as abuse.
How to fix it — 3 steps
- Stop retrying immediately; wait the interval given in the Retry-After header before the next call.
- Add exponential backoff with jitter to the client and cache responses so repeat calls are avoided.
- Request a higher quota, batch your calls, or spread the work across time or multiple keys.
Terminal / CLI command
curl -sD - -o /dev/null "https://api.example.com/" | grep -i retry-afterReads the Retry-After value so you know exactly how long to pause.
How to confirm the fix: Requests succeed again after the wait, and sustained usage stays under the limit with backoff in place.
Prevent it from coming back
Design clients to respect rate limits from the start: token buckets, caching, and backoff on 429/503.
Frequently asked questions
Should I just change my IP to get around it?
No. That is fragile and often against the service’s terms. Fix the request rate, add caching, or ask for a higher quota.