Understanding Automation Rate Limits Across Social Media Platforms

This guide will walk you through the automation rate limits for LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter/ X. Understanding these limits is key to keeping your workflows safe, compliant and running smoothly, just like sticking to speed limits on the road.

What are rate limits

Rate limits control how many actions you can do within a specific time period.
For example, there might be a limit on how many times you can sign in to your account per hour.
Many websites and apps deploy rate limits to limit network traffic, maximize stability, and distinguish between human activity and bots.

Rate limits will have a big influence on how you automate. For example, if you send too many messages or scrape too many LinkedIn profiles, your account could be flagged for unusual activity.

Why should you pay attention to rate limits

Paying attention to rate limits when you automate social media actions is key to enhancing your experience and keeping things running smoothly.

Here is why you should keep an eye on them:

• Protect your social media account: Rate limits allow platforms to detect unusual behavior, which may lead to them disconnecting or even restricting your account.
• Maintain ethical engagement practices: By restricting spam-like behavior, such as bombarding profiles with messages.
• Prevent bot attacks: They act as a security measure, stopping people from using the service excessively for malicious intentions.
• Keep the system open to everyone: Rate limits conserve platform resources so that everything runs smoothly for each user.

Platform-specific limits

LinkedIn rate limits

LinkedIn rate limits will vary depending on your account type and how active it is.

Here’s a breakdown of the main LinkedIn rate limits (with some caveats):

• If you use PhantomBuster’s email discovery service: You should only process half of the recommended limits. This is because the automation has to open 2 pages per profile to run the email search.
• If you launch more than one automation: These limits only apply to one automation. For multiple sequences, check the maximum limit for each tool and divide it by the number of automations you’re running.
• If you’re running multiple actions across various Phantoms at once: Space out your automations’ launches to stop LinkedIn from spotting “bot behavior.”
• If you’re working over long periods: Change your launch times occasionally. LinkedIn may become suspicious if your automations launch at the same time for a while.

Instagram rate limits

Instagram has strict rate limits, especially for actions like following, liking, and commenting.
Here are some factors that will influence rate limits for Instagram:

• Instagram now only displays up to a maximum of 28 posts per hashtag or less. With this change, you cannot export more than 28 posts per hashtag search.
• Due to a new limitation from Instagram, a maximum of 50 followers will be displayed for certain profiles.
• Remember that follower counts are not always correct. Certain profiles that are banned, deleted, or otherwise unavailable may still be counted in the follower count, but will not be scraped by the Phantom.
• Instagram doesn’t specifically mention how many actions you can take per day, but it might block your account if it detects suspicious activity. Even though the Phantoms can perform unlimited actions, we recommend you start slow and scale your automations.

Facebook rate limits

Facebook’s rate limits are less transparent, as multiple factors influence them. To stay within safe limits, start slowly and gradually increase your activity.

Facebook rate limits: Phantom automations

Facebook manual actions and platform limits (outside of PhantomBuster)

Some Facebook limits apply to actions you perform manually, outside of PhantomBuster. These actions are still important to keep in mind, especially if your workflow involves interacting with people or groups directly on Facebook. Exceeding these limits can trigger warnings, restrictions, or even account flags.
Here are some common manual limits to be aware of:

• Sending messages: Varies; start slow and increase gradually to avoid flags.
• Recipients per message: Max 150 people in a single conversation.
• Joining groups: Up to 25 groups per day.
• Liking posts: Around 5 per hour, with a daily cap of 35.
• Sending friend requests: Max 499 per day.
• Accepting friend requests: Around 20 per day.
• Adding friends to groups: Max 50 invites per day.
• Inviting friends to like/follow pages: Max 200 total invites.
• Liking pages: Up to 5,000 pages total.

Twitter/X rate limits

Twitter’s limitations are fairly consistent, aside from the shift from 140 to 280 characters.
However, your account’s limits may vary based on how frequently you use Twitter/X and how many followers you have.

According to Twitter’s recommendation, this is a technical account limit only, and there are additional rules prohibiting aggressive following behavior (which are not public).

What to do if you exceed a rate limit

If you exceed your rate limits, you might see a warning or error message from the social network. If this happens, pause all your automations.

You may need to wait out a temporary penalty or log back in, but once that’s done, you can resume your activity at a safer pace.

Ignoring rate limits can lead to stricter consequences, so it’s best to act on the first warning. To avoid issues in the future, follow these best practices:

1. Time your actions wisely: Schedule automation to run during active hours in your time zone, and ‘warm up’ your social media activity gradually.
2. Personalize your messages: Avoid robotic-sounding messages to reduce spam detection.
3. Review your strategy: Adjust your approach if engagement is low, and avoid including links in messages.
4. Respect platform rules: Never post spam, offensive, or inappropriate content.
5. Treat support teams with respect: If you need help restoring access, stay polite and cooperative.

By gradually increasing your activity, staying mindful of rate limits, and optimizing your automation settings, you can avoid interruptions while keeping your accounts in good standing.

Related guides

Best Practices for Social Media Platform Automations

LinkedIn Limits For Connection Requests And Messages

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