Rate Limit Use Cases

Discover when requests to a tenant are rate-limited

There are a handful of ways to determine if a customer product is being rate limited by Auth0. See below for the possible causes of rate limitation.

Tenant logs

By subscribing to different tenant logs, you can track issues related to request volumes. To understand how tenant and operations event logs work in Auth0, read Logs.

api_limit

The api_limit event is triggered immediately after a rate limit is exceeded for the global rate limit bucket for the Authentication or Management API. If the number of request tokens utilized remains above 80% after one minute for the same rate limit bucket, a second warning log is generated. If a rate limit is exceeded for a different rate limit bucket, a new api_limit event is generated. This helps customers identify which rate limit configuration their API calls are triggering, which is a critical first step in diagnosing the root cause.

api_limit_warning

The api_limit_warning log is triggered when a customer’s request rate consumes 80% of the request tokens for a given rate limit bucket. If the number of request tokens utilized remains above 80% after one minute for the same rate limit bucket, a second warning log is generated. If the 80% threshold is exceeded for a different rate limit bucket, a new api_limit_warning log is created.

appi (Public Performance Burst Only)

The appi log is triggered when a customer tenant with a Public Performance Burst add-on exceeds their sustained Authentication API request rate limit of 100 RPS, consuming a 15-minute block of their 48-hour burst allocation. If, after 15 minutes, the request rate exceeds the 100 RPS sustained request limit again, a second appi log will be triggered.

API responses

Auth0 API responses deliver HTTP 429 (Too Many Requests) responses with the exceeded rate limit. This enables customers to observe rate limit enforcement in real time. However, this is only useful for custom-built customer applications interacting directly with the Auth0 API.

SDK error handling

If you are using an SDK, refer to the Management API SDK libraries error pages.

Error pages

The error page response is sent for endpoints that render HTML content to the end user. If your tenant is configured to use generic (Auth0 hosted) pages, Auth0 renders the error page instead of the expected content when you exceed the response limit.  If your tenant is configured to use custom error pages, the user is redirected to the custom error page URL with the relevant error in the error_description query string parameter.  For more information, see Affected endpoints and the JSON Error descriptions.

Find out why a tenant is being rate limited

If you believe tenant requests are rate limited and need assistance to understand why, open a request via the Support Center.  As part of your request, please include the full raw log where the issue was seen.

Predict when requests to a tenant will be rate limited

Auth0 reports up-to-date information on the current status of your rate limits using HTTP response headers from endpoints that have rate limit policies configured. This status is communicated as follows:

• x-ratelimit-limit: Maximum number of requests available.
• x-ratelimit-remaining: Number of remaining requests available until the bucket is refilled with additional requests.
• x-ratelimit-reset: UNIX timestamp, in seconds, of the expected time when additional requests will be added to the bucket.

For example:

An API has the following rate limit:

• Burst Limit: 1000
• Sustained Rate Limit: 100 requests per second (on a fixed window)

From this information, you can derive:

• The sustained rate limit is 100 requests per second on a fixed window.
• Due to the fixed window, the bucket of requests is refilled every second.

If you receive the following x-headers in your API response:

• x-ratelimit-limit: 1000
• x-ratelimit-remaining: 50
• x-ratelimit-reset: 1675452600

You now know that:

• Your tenant has used up 950 of the 1000 requests allowable to that API, and only has 50 requests remaining until such time that additional requests are added.
• New requests will be added at 1675452600, or 7:30:00 PM UTC on February 3, 2023.
• 1 new request will be added at that time

Therefore, if you are making requests at a rate greater than what is described above, then a rate limitation is expected.  How soon you will be rate limited depends on the burst limit and to what extent you are exceeding the sustained limit.

Examples of how rate limits are enforced

Requests per second example

Assume Auth0 launches a new API called /ratelimitexample with the following rate limit values:

• Burst limit: Five (5) requests
• Sustained rate limit: 10 requests per second.

Key points:

• API begins with, and will never exceed, five request tokens, which is equal to the burst limit.
• The bucket of 10 tokens is refilled every second, using a “fixed window.” New tokens are added to the bucket, refilling it at the “top” of each second.

 Example scenario with rate limits:

In this scenario:

• T0 - T1sec:  The end user makes six requests in the first second.  Five requests – equal to the burst limit – receive a 200 response.  The sixth request receives a 429 error because there are no remaining request tokens in the bucket.
• T1sec - T2sec:  Auth0 tops off the bucket of request tokens because of the fixed window algorithm. As a result, the seventh through 11th requests are successful, exhausting the bucket by the 12th request, resulting in a 429 error.
• T2sec - T3sec:  Auth0 refills the token bucket once again, and the next request (13) receives a 200 response.

Requests per minute example

Assume Auth0 launches a new API called /ratelimitexample2 with the following rate limit values:

• Burst limit:  Five (5) requests
• Sustained Rate limit:  Six (6) requests per minute.

Key points:

• API begins with five request tokens, which is equal to the burst limit.
• The bucket of six tokens is refilled every minute, using a “fixed window.” New tokens are added to the bucket, refilling the it at the “top” of each minute.

Example scenario with rate limits:

In this scenario:

• T0 - T+1min:  The end user makes six requests in the first minute. Five requests – equal to the burst limit – receive a 200 response.  The sixth request receives a 429 error because there are no remaining request tokens.
• T+1min - T+2min:  Auth0 refills the token bucket because of the fixed window algorithm. As a result, the seventh through 11th requests are successful, exhausting the bucket by the 12th request, resulting in a 429 error.
• T+2min: Auth0 refills the token bucket once again, and the next request (13) receives a 200 response.

Other scenarios

On occasion, Auth0 will assign two rate limits to a single API.  This is done in order to configure a burst limit and the sustained rate limit that is more customized to the needs of the service.  In effect, the first rate limit becomes the effective burst limit, and the second rate limit becomes the effective sustained rate limit.  In this scenario, Auth0 only publishes the effective burst and sustained rate limits, rather than communicating the actual burst and sustained rate limits.

End-user Login and Signup API usage

There are a handful of Authentication Flows, including Login, Signup and Change Password.  The most common of these are typically Login, followed by Signup.

An end user’s login initiates multiple API calls to Authentication API endpoints in order to determine if the end user is authorized to receive an Authorization token, and thereby access the application they have requested.

The precise number of API calls is a function of a handful of configurations:

• Authentication Experience (e.g., New Universal Login or Classic Login)
• Authentication Flow (e.g., Login, Signup, or Change Password)
• Authentication Flow Type (e.g., Login via Username / Password; Login via Social Login; Login when an existing Authentication Token already exists)

Below, we describe some common customer configurations, and their impact on API Usage.

Universal Login

Auth0 Universal Login provides the essential feature of an authorization server: the login flow. When a user needs to prove their identity to gain access to your application, you can redirect them to Universal Login and let Auth0 handle the authentication process.

Authentication flow	Flow type	Requests to Authentication API endpoints
Login	Username/Password Challenge*	5
Login	3rd Party Identity Provider – e.g., Social or Work Login	6
Login	Auth0 Authentication Session Exists	1
Signup	via Username/Password	6

Modifiers

Certain authentication configurations modify the base request count. These adjustments depend on additional security measures or authentication flows:

Modifier	Description	Additional Requests
ID First	Identifies the user before requesting credentials.	+2
MFA	Adds Multi-Factor Authentication.	+2 per factor
OTP	One-time password for Authentication	+2
Enterprise Login	Authentication through an enterprise connection (e.g., SAML, OIDC, LDAP).	+1
Client Credentials	Used for machine-to-machine authentication. Applies universally, even if actions are used.	+1

*Anything used in combination adds to the overall requests.

Classic login

Classic Login is an Auth0-hosted login experience that relies on JavaScript for customization. Implementing Classic Login is less complex than embedding the authentication process directly in your app, and can help prevent the dangers of cross-origin authentication.

Authentication flow	Flow type	Requests
Login	Username/password challenge	8
Login	3rd Party Identity Provider – e.g., Social or Work Login	8
Login	Auth0 authentication session exists	2
Signup	Username/password	8

Customers configuring Custom Databases should add two (2) additional authentication API calls to each authentication flow described above. For more details, see Custom Database Connections.

Modifiers

The following factors increase request counts for Classic Login:

Modifier	Description	Additional Requests
SMS Authentication Only	When using SMS as the primary authentication method.	+7
Native Social Login	Login using a native social provider (e.g., Google, Facebook).	+1
Redirects	Additional redirects during authentication increase request count.	+1