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Does anyone have any clue why Instagram has reduced their hourly API request limit from 5000 to just 200? Is this a bug or the new normal? Do instagram partners undergo the same lowering of rate limit?

The page on rate limits in the documentation is a broken link.

:::UPDATES FROM INSTAGRAM via MAIL:::

To summarize, Basically Instagram API is shutting down faster than speed of light right now. Migrate your apps to FB-instagram-API to keep your business or apps running

Narayan Singh
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  • You're referring to a broken link! – N00b Pr0grammer Mar 31 '18 at 06:51
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    That's the point. Its a broken link from the docs. – Narayan Singh Mar 31 '18 at 06:54
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    Same for me :( Instagram API request failed, response http code is: '429', response is: '{"error_type": "OAuthRateLimitException", "code": 429, "error_message": "You have exceeded the maximum number of requests per hour. You have performed a total of 426 requests in the last hour. Our general maximum limit is set at 200 requests per hour."}' – Ka. Mar 31 '18 at 07:22
  • Noticed this too ☹ maybe quick changes following the Cambridge Analytica scandal. – Adrien Rey-Jarthon Mar 31 '18 at 08:07
  • The link to limit doc has been broken for at least one month, I noticed that back then – Ka. Mar 31 '18 at 10:47
  • Do you guys think this is a bug and will be resolved within a couple of hours or is this the new limit that they are allowing? – Narayan Singh Mar 31 '18 at 13:20
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    @NarayaN I think that, unfortunately, it's the new rate limit, the message is clear: "Our general maximum limit is set at 200 requests per hour" But, as usual, they have not notified the users of the API before making the change and they have no added nothing to their API change log: https://www.instagram.com/developer/changelog/ – Jordi Mar 31 '18 at 18:58
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    See this as well: https://www.facebook.com/events/1775403846100340/?ti=icl – Ka. Apr 01 '18 at 22:07
  • @Ka. That content is not available. Could you please share what you saw before it got deleted or blocked? – Narayan Singh Apr 02 '18 at 12:15
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    Now, why in the world would I develop an app using Graph API given how the current API users have been treated – Alin Apr 03 '18 at 17:33
  • each page request of a paginated endpoint all counts as 1 request towards the rate limit right? – Gukki5 Apr 03 '18 at 21:35
  • @Gukki5 If you use 1 API endpoint, It is counted as 1. So yes in your case. – Narayan Singh Apr 04 '18 at 03:11

2 Answers2

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Yes, from what I think are updated Facebook docs.

Rate Limiting

The Instagram API uses the same rate limiting as the Graph API (200 calls per user per hour) with one exception: the /media/comments edge limits writes to 60 writes per user per hour. Please refer to the Graph API's rate limiting documentation for more information.

Facebook documentation

Community
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Scott S
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Seems to be in relation to trying to clean up privacy and user data usage.

TechCrunch article - https://techcrunch.com/2018/04/02/instagram-api-limit/

Without warning, Instagram has broken many of the unofficial apps built on its platform. This weekend it surprised developers with a massive reduction in how much data they can pull from the Instagram API, shrinking the API limit from 5,000 to 200 calls per user per hour. Apps that help people figure out if their followers follow them back or interact with them, analyze their audiences or find relevant hashtags are now quickly running into their API limits, leading to broken functionality and pissed off users.

Two sources confirmed the new limits to TechCrunch, and developers are complaining about the situation on StackOverflow.

Joshua Dance
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    Seems they reverted... the error spike in our logs dropped... – dstj Apr 03 '18 at 19:15
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    Nevermind, they are back: `You have performed a total of 219 requests in the last hour. Our general maximum limit is set at 200 requests per hour` – dstj Apr 03 '18 at 20:44
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    As far as I understand, They will not revert back. – Narayan Singh Apr 04 '18 at 03:11
  • Limit now set to 500 it seems... `You have performed a total of 525 requests in the last hour. Our general maximum limit is set at 500 requests per hour` – dstj Apr 04 '18 at 13:53
  • @dstj I am not experiencing this, can you provide more information? I'm still seeing 200 request limit in headers – shakked Apr 04 '18 at 14:25
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    I experience limit set to 500 only in sandbox mode. In normal mode still 200. – slawek Apr 06 '18 at 17:37
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    Damn you put me into an infinite loop following the circular reference! – thephpdev Jun 14 '18 at 09:18