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API Limits and Guidelines
Use the Marketing Cloud Engagement APIs to integrate your applications and other technology systems with Marketing Cloud Engagement. To protect our Service and ensure the availability of Marketing Cloud Engagement for all customers, Salesforce places limits on API usage.
Limit Types
There are two types of API limits. A hard limit is one that you can’t exceed. In most cases, if you issue an API request that exceeds a hard limit, the API rejects the request and returns an error.
A soft limit is one that can degrade performance if you exceed it. Salesforce reserves the right to rate limit API requests if they cause system performance or security issues. In some cases, you must purchase additional licenses or allocations if you exceed a soft limit.
General API Limits
The limits in this section apply to both the Marketing Cloud Engagement SOAP and REST APIs.
| Resource | Limit | Limit Type | Details |
|---|---|---|---|
| Maximum API request volume | The limit depends on your edition
|
Soft limit | You can purchase an additional allocation of contacts or API requests. Contact your account executive for more information. |
| Maximum number of asynchronous requests per day | 50 million requests per day | Soft limit | This limit applies to asynchronous REST API and SOAP API requests. |
| Maximum number of access token requests | 1 request every 20 minutes per client machine | Soft limit | Don’t request a new token with every API request. Instead, use the expires_in parameter in the response to a token request to
determine how long an existing access token remains valid. Request a new token only when the
existing token expires. |
| Maximum batch size for synchronous API requests | 50 objects | Soft limit | — |
| Maximum batch size for asynchronous API requests | 32,000 objects | Hard limit | — |
| Minimum request timeout period for synchronous API requests | The timeout period depends on the type of API operation
|
Soft limit | Match the timeout values of your API clients with these values. |
| Minimum request timeout period for asynchronous API requests | 30 seconds | Soft limit | Match the timeout values of your API clients with these values. |
Marketing Cloud Engagement REST API Limits
The Marketing Cloud Engagement REST API gives you broad access to the features and capabilities of several apps, including Content Builder and Journey Builder.
| Resource | Limit | Limit Type | Details |
|---|---|---|---|
| Maximum request rate for Transactional Messaging API requests | 1,000 requests per second for static and simple messages | Soft limit | A static message contains no content blocks or personalization elements. A simple message includes one HTML content block and 1–2 personalization elements, such as the recipient's name and order number. Transactional messages that include more than one content block and personalization elements other than name and order number have lower throughput rates. |
| Maximum request rate for batched Transactional Messaging API requests | 250 requests per second | Soft limit | This limit assumes a batch size of 50 recipients per request and a static or simple message body. |
| Maximum request rate for synchronous Device API requests | 4,000 requests per minute | Soft limit | — |
| Maximum request rate for synchronous API requests | 2,500 requests per minute | Soft limit | This limit applies to all API requests except Device API requests and access token requests. |
| Maximum number of concurrent connections | 100 connections | Soft limit | — |
| Maximum request payload size for Auth API | 8 KB | Hard limit | — |
| Maximum request payload size for Data API | 5.9 MB | Hard limit | — |
| Maximum request payload size for Asset API | 25 MB | Hard limit | — |
| Maximum request payload size for Messaging API | 16 MB | Hard limit | — |
| Maximum request payload size for Automation API | 27.9 MB | Hard limit | — |
| Maximum request payload size for all other Marketing Cloud Engagement APIs | 4 MB | Hard limit | — |
| Maximum batch size for MobilePush Send API | 5,000 objects | Hard limit | — |
| Batch size for ENS Callback API | Minimum: 100 objects Maximum: 1,000 objects |
Hard limit | — |
Marketing Cloud Engagement SOAP API Limits
The Marketing Cloud Engagement SOAP API provides in-depth integration with Email Studio. You can use SOAP API to create and send email messages, and to view response data for email messages.
| Resource | Limit | Limit Type | Details |
|---|---|---|---|
| Maximum request rate for synchronous API requests | 2,500 API requests per minute | Soft limit | — |
| Maximum number of concurrent connections | 100 connections | Soft limit | — |
| Maximum request payload size | 28.6 MB | Hard limit | — |
| Maximum number of records returned per response | 2,500 records per response | Hard limit | If a result contains more than 2,500 records, the API provides a token that you can use in a subsequent request to retrieve the next batch of 2,500 records. |
