Comparing API limits across platform plans

Compare API limits by estimating the work each integration must do, then match that work to the exact API family, store plan and quota unit. A larger published number helps only if it applies to the connector’s requests and leaves room for other work at the same time.

Inventory the calls

Ask each supplier which API and endpoints its connector uses, how many records one call handles, when jobs run and how retries work. Separate stock, orders, catalogue jobs and reporting. Shopper-facing traffic belongs in its own API assessment.

Use the busiest plausible period, including a concurrent catalogue change. Ask whether the connector batches records, uses webhooks or polls repeatedly; those choices change its demand.

Keep API families and units separate

Shopify GraphQL Admin API measures calculated query points. Its bucket belongs to an app-and-store combination.

Shopify documents restore rates of 100 points per second for its Standard tier, 200 for Advanced Shopify, 1,000 for Shopify Plus and 2,000 for Shopify for enterprise (Commerce Components). A single query cannot exceed 1,000 requested points, regardless of plan.

Array inputs have a separate 250-item maximum. Check the app’s requested and actual query costs, rather than counting each HTTP request as one point.

Shopify’s Storefront API has a different rate limit from the Admin API. The 2026-04 reference says the limit is based on the IP address making the request; for requests made by the documented library, that is the server’s address. Do not use the Admin API restore rate as a storefront capacity figure.

BigCommerce REST APIs consume request units shared by apps accessing a store. The developer page still uses the older labels Standard, Plus and Pro, listing 150 requests per 30 seconds for Standard and Plus and 450 for Pro. BigCommerce’s 2026 plan update renames these Core, Growth and Scale respectively.

A Performance account or special contract needs its actual allowance checked. Inspect the proposed account’s rate-limit response headers; a plan rename alone does not prove the allowance available to every resource or integration.

BigCommerce B2B Edition APIs have a separate documented limit of 150 requests per minute across integrations using those APIs.

WooCommerce Store API offers optional rate limiting, disabled by default. When enabled, its documented default is a maximum of 25 requests per 10 seconds, and the limit can be changed.

Its separate checkout control can be enabled for the Checkout block and Store API place-order flow; when enabled, it allows a maximum of 3 requests per 60 seconds.

These are configurable protection controls on an installation, not universal WooCommerce hosting-plan quotas. Obtain the host’s and implementer’s limits for the API route the connector actually uses.

API Rate Limits Across Ecommerce Platform Plans (Australia)

Key API Performance Metrics for Australian Ecommerce Platforms

Calculate headroom and choose a route

Put scheduled calls on a timeline. For Shopify Admin GraphQL, use query-cost and throttle data. For BigCommerce REST, count requests across apps sharing the store quota and check response headers. Allow for retries and manual work, and state assumptions beside the result.

If essential updates would be delayed, ask whether the connector can batch, move a non-urgent job, use an appropriate bulk route or replace polling with events.

Shopify’s asynchronous bulk mutations have separate file-size, runtime and concurrency limits, so they are not an unlimited substitute for live updates.

Request logs or a demonstration from the proposed configuration, then decide whether essential changes finish within the business’s acceptable delay and can recover after throttling.

Scheduled API Call Workload Assessment Timeline