BrowserCat’s public documentation reviewed for this guide does not publish a numeric API request-rate limit or a specific throttling and retry contract. A documented reason requests can be rejected is reaching your account’s hard spending limit without approving an increase. Check account usage and billing, BrowserCat’s live status, and your connection setup before treating a failure as rate limiting.
Does BrowserCat have an API rate limit?
BrowserCat’s public pricing and FAQ pages do not establish a numeric requests-per-second or requests-per-minute limit, a burst allowance, or a general API throttling response and retry policy. They do not document a BrowserCat-specific HTTP 429 response, a Retry-After header, or a fixed backoff interval. Avoid building assumptions about those behaviors into a client unless BrowserCat’s current documentation or support confirms them. BrowserCat pricing
Concurrent capacity is not a per-second limit
BrowserCat’s pricing page lists 1,000 concurrent requests on plans. Concurrency describes simultaneous capacity; the page does not define that figure as a requests-per-second threshold, a burst allowance, or an API-wide rate limit. Do not infer one from the other. Check the current plan terms for your account.
Why might BrowserCat reject requests?
A hard spending limit can block requests
BrowserCat’s FAQ describes account soft and hard spending limits. After an account crosses its soft limit, BrowserCat asks the user to approve an incremental increase. If the hard limit is reached without approval, BrowserCat says it begins rejecting requests. The block continues until the billing period ends or the user approves the increase. This is a documented billing-limit block, not evidence by itself of request-rate throttling. BrowserCat FAQ
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The FAQ lists free-plan soft and hard defaults of $10 and $20 and describes the paid-plan hard limit as twice the monthly subscription. Those are vendor-published terms reviewed in 2026, not API rate limits; verify the current terms and your account’s actual limits in the dashboard before relying on them.
Other failures need diagnosis
A failed connection or browser session does not establish that you exceeded a request quota. The available public materials do not provide a complete error-code taxonomy that maps every failure to a cause. Use the response or client error, account state, service status, and connection details to narrow it down.
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What to do when BrowserCat requests fail
- Record the failure safely. Note the endpoint, timestamp, request path, and exact client error. If there is an HTTP response, record its status and body. Distinguish a failure while opening the WebSocket connection from one that occurs after a browser session starts. Do not include your API key in logs or support messages.
- Check account usage and billing. Open your BrowserCat dashboard and inspect usage, billing, and any limit-approval prompt. BrowserCat says requests can be rejected after an account reaches its hard spending limit without approval. If that is the cause, follow the account prompt to approve an increase or wait until the billing period ends. BrowserCat dashboard and product
- Check the live service status. Look at the current status of Browser Fleet (Websocket API) and Utility Endpoints (REST API) on BrowserCat’s status page. The page’s Sep. 29, 2026 update listed both as operational; that dated snapshot is not a guarantee of present availability.
- Verify connection configuration. BrowserCat’s quick start shows Playwright connecting to
wss://api.browsercat.com/connectwith anApi-Keyheader. Compare your endpoint and header with the current BrowserCat quick start, and confirm the key is valid without exposing it. The quick start recommends Playwright; BrowserCat also supports Puppeteer and CDP-based clients, but changing libraries is not documented as a fix for an API rejection. - Do not assume a retry contract. The public sources do not specify a numeric throttle threshold, rate-limit status code,
Retry-Afterbehavior, or retry schedule. Use the details in the actual error, and contact BrowserCat support if the account, status, and setup checks do not explain it. Avoid aggressive automatic retries when the cause is unknown.
Separate account limits from concurrency and throttling
| What you see or know | What the sources establish | What to check next |
|---|---|---|
| Account reached its hard spending limit | BrowserCat says it rejects requests until the billing period ends or an increase is approved. BrowserCat FAQ | Dashboard usage, billing, and limit-approval prompt. |
| Pricing shows 1,000 concurrent requests | This is listed as concurrent capacity, not defined as a request-rate threshold. BrowserCat pricing | Do not treat the figure as a per-second or burst limit. |
| Connection or session fails, with no established billing cause | Public sources do not map every failure to a cause or define a general retry contract. | Inspect the error, live status, and endpoint/key configuration; ask BrowserCat support if unresolved. |
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Frequently Asked Questions
If a BrowserCat request returns HTTP 429, should I retry after a fixed delay?
The reviewed public BrowserCat sources do not specify a 429 policy, Retry-After header, or fixed retry interval. Use the response details and confirm retry guidance with BrowserCat before hard-coding a schedule.
Does changing from Playwright to Puppeteer fix a rejected request?
BrowserCat supports Playwright, Puppeteer, and CDP-based clients, but its public materials do not promise that switching clients resolves an API rejection.
Quick Recap
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Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon at the time of purchase will apply.
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