When using our amazing automations and integrations, it’s important to remember that there is a limit to the number of triggers and actions that can run per minute. This limit is called the “rate limit.”
In this article, we’ll learn more about why rate limits exist, what happens if you reach one of them, and how to prevent rate limits from being reached. Let’s get started!
On the limits of rhythm
Rate limits are in place to prevent high load on our server that may cause issues with the monday.com platform (such as downtime, slowdowns, etc.). Additionally, because our rate limits are relatively high and difficult to reach, reaching the rate limit may indicate accidentally created automation or integration loops.
There are two types of rate limits that work in slightly different ways:
- Automation rate limits (monday.com API limits)
- Integration rate limits (third-party API limits)
Check out the next two sections of the article to learn about each type of rate limit!
Automation rate limits
For our automations, we have a limit within the monday.com API where each recipe can execute a certain number of triggers or actions per minute.
This limit may be realized if:
- You have an automation loop that causes automation recipes to continue running endlessly.
- You use APIs or webhooks to trigger your automations
- You use group actions to run multiple automation recipes at the same time
Integration rate limits
Integrations allow you to connect monday.com to other platforms and create automated actions between monday.com and the connected app. Therefore, integration rate limits are set by the third-party app’s API to prevent overloading their servers (these limits are not set by monday.com).
For example, in our integration with Outlook, a rate limit is set by Outlook that will stop anyone who tries to create too many actions from monday.com within Outlook in a minute (like sending too many emails in one go, for example).
Similar to automation rate limits, the integration rate limit may be realized if:
- You have an integration loop that causes integration recipes to continue running endlessly.
- You use APIs or webhooks to trigger your integrations
- You are using Group actions To run multiple integration recipes at the same time
What happens when you reach the rhythm limit?
If you’ve reached the rate limit of your automation or integration, you’ll receive an alert to let you know that the automation or integration failed to run. If your automation or integration continues to fire triggers, it may eventually run with a delay.
Additionally, you can see this delay in your automation activity report. Here you can identify whether the rate limit was reached due to the monday.com API limit (via automations) or due to the API limit of an external application (via integrations).
How to avoid reaching the rate limit
Have you reached your pace limit? Looking for ways to prevent it in the future? If so, keep reading to learn about some of our tips for preventing your pace limit from being reached with automations or integrations!
For automation rate limits:
- We recommend identifying the reason why the automation was triggered so many times in one minute (whether it was via API, webhook, automation loop, or batch actions) and adjusting your workflow accordingly so that this limit does not materialize in the future.
- Try simplifying your workflow! If you can achieve similar results while removing automations that aren’t absolutely necessary, that might help in this situation.
For integration rate limits:
- Similar to automations, we recommend identifying the reason why the integration was being triggered so many times per minute and adjusting your workflow accordingly so that this limit does not materialize in the future.
- You can also try increasing your access quota through the third-party app you partner with.
- Finally, you can split your integration recipes across accounts. For example, if you send a lot of emails through Outlook integration, you can try splitting it up across several different connected Outlook accounts, thus reducing the load on each individual Outlook account.
Complexity boundaries
Similar to the rate limits mentioned above, monday.com also has an additional limit on the number of general actions or actions (such as moving items, using group actions, transferring information from one board to another, etc.) that your account may perform in a given period of time. These limits are known as “complexity limits” and are in place to help reduce the load on our servers and prevent potential performance issues on the platform.
Complexity limits are set by a calculation that assumes the load a particular operation will add to our system. This limit is reset every 60 seconds and is set per account (not per user) regardless of plan type.
What happens when you reach the border?
If you reach the complexity limit, you will immediately receive a warning message letting you know that the limit has been reached. The message will read: “One of your automations failed. Warning: Too many automations were running at the same time. Click here to view it.”
Additionally, the action that led to the complexity limit being reached may be delayed or canceled entirely, depending on the situation that occurred. You can see more details about this error by visiting the “Automation Activity” window under your current “Board Automations” in the Automation Center.
If this happens, we recommend trying to perform “smaller” actions (perhaps moving items manually, or selecting fewer items when using bulk actions). We also recommend checking if there are any loops in your automations that are causing them to run endlessly, causing you to perform too many actions on your account at once.