Rately

Product Introduction

1. Rately is an enterprise-grade rate limiting service built on Cloudflare's global network, designed to protect APIs and web services from abuse or overload. It enables organizations to define granular rate limits based on user IDs, API keys, geographic locations, headers, endpoints, or custom parameters. The service operates as a drop-in solution with ~25ms latency, enforcing rules at the edge before requests reach backend servers.
2. The core value of Rately lies in its ability to replace months of custom rate-limiting development with a fully managed, infrastructure-free solution. It ensures API security and performance by dynamically applying limits aligned with business logic, such as premium user tiers or regional traffic patterns, while maintaining sub-30ms decision latency through Cloudflare's edge network.

Main Features

1. Rately provides multi-dimensional rate limiting that supports rules based on user IDs, API keys, IP addresses, HTTP headers, geographic regions, and specific API endpoints. For example, organizations can enforce 10x higher rate limits for premium users or block excessive requests from specific countries.
2. Real-time usage analytics offer per-rule metrics, traffic pattern visualization, and abuse detection alerts through a centralized dashboard. This includes monitoring of request volumes, limit breaches, and geographic distribution of traffic.
3. Geo-aware rate limiting allows granular control by country, city, or region, enabling use cases like surge protection in specific markets or offering premium API access in licensed territories. Rules can combine geographic data with other parameters like user tiers.

Problems Solved

1. Rately eliminates the need for organizations to build and maintain custom rate-limiting infrastructure, which typically requires months of engineering effort for distributed enforcement and analytics.
2. The product targets API-first companies and enterprises managing high-traffic services that require protection against DDoS attacks, credential stuffing, or API endpoint abuse.
3. Typical use cases include enforcing tiered API access for free vs. paid users, preventing brute-force attacks on authentication endpoints, and mitigating traffic spikes during regional promotional campaigns.

Unique Advantages

1. Unlike traditional cloud-based rate limiters, Rately executes rules at Cloudflare's edge locations, reducing enforcement latency to ~25ms compared to the 100-300ms typical of origin-server solutions.
2. The service introduces dynamic user-tier recognition, automatically applying predefined rate limits based on real-time user authentication status or API key validation without code changes.
3. Competitive advantages include zero infrastructure requirements, native integration with Cloudflare's security stack, and the ability to combine multiple parameters (e.g., "VIP users from Germany may make 500 requests/sec to /api/payments") in single rules.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

1. How does Rately handle latency-sensitive applications? Rately enforces rate limits at Cloudflare's edge nodes located in 300+ global cities, ensuring sub-30ms decision latency that doesn't add meaningful delay to API responses.
2. Can we apply different limits for paid vs. free users? Yes, Rately automatically detects user tiers through API keys or authentication tokens, applying configured limits (e.g., 1000 requests/minute for enterprise vs. 100 for trial users) without backend modifications.
3. What geographic granularity is supported for location-based rules? Limits can be set at country, regional (e.g., EU), or city level, with optional combination with other parameters like user tiers or specific API endpoints.
4. How is header-based rate limiting implemented? Customers can define rules based on any HTTP header value, such as limiting clients with "X-Client-Type: mobile" to 50 requests/second or blocking outdated "X-API-Version: v1" requests.
5. Does Rately require changes to existing API infrastructure? In proxy mode, it operates as a reverse proxy requiring only DNS changes, while API mode (coming soon) will enable programmatic limit checks via REST endpoints.