An interactive explainer

A rate limit does not count your requests. It counts your credit.

Sixty requests a minute sounds like a simple rule. It isn't. Send them spread out and they all get through. Send the same sixty together and half get refused — and with the counter most people write first, you can push double the limit through and nothing notices.

Rate limiting · Token bucket · 429 Too Many Requests

Networking · Beginner · 9 min · How a service decides who gets in — an interactive explainer on ViLearn, with a simulation and a knowledge check. All explainers.

Related: How two strangers agree they can hear each other · How the internet finds google.com · How two strangers get a secret past everyone in the room