Zapier and the apps that you use have limits to ensure their infrastructure can efficiently serve all customers.
Task limits
Each Zapier plan includes a monthly task allowance. A task is counted each time an action step in your Zap runs successfully. Trigger, filter, and certain built-in tool steps do not count as tasks.
When you reach your task limit:
- Your Zap runs will be held, not lost. Held runs are paused and can be replayed from your Zap History once you have available tasks.
- Zapier sends email notifications as you approach and reach your limit.
If you need more tasks, you can enable pay-per-task billing to continue running Zaps beyond your plan's included tasks, or upgrade your plan for a higher monthly allowance.
Zap step limits
General step limits
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Zaps are limited to 100 steps, including all steps within paths.
- If you need more than 100 steps, you can separate your Zap into multiple Zaps.
- During a free trial, only the first 30 steps of a Zap will run.
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Each action step has a limit of 1,000 fields.
- This includes fields like Name and Email Address that are standard in your app and custom fields that you create in your app.
- If you're a member of a Zapier Enterprise account and your account admins or owners enabled publishing restrictions, you must request their approval before the Zap can be published.
Moving steps
- You can only drag and drop individual path steps. You cannot drag and drop an entire path group.
- If you reorder a step or path and place that step after another that uses its information, you’ll see an alert asking you to update mapped fields, as these will no longer be available after the move.
- Triggers and path conditions cannot be moved.
- Steps can only be moved within the same Zap.
Copying and pasting steps
You can only:
- Replace a single path with another single path.
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Replace a path group with another path group.
- All action steps, paths, and filter conditions for that path or path group will be copied and replaced.
- Paste a path or path group at the end of a Zap.
You cannot copy and paste steps:
- That use a private app connection that has not been shared with you.
- That use a private app that you don’t have access to.
- Between different Zapier accounts.
- Between different internet browsers.
- While using Firefox’s private mode.
Zap rate limits
When a large number of triggers or actions occur within a short time span, they will be throttled (rate limited) to reduce their frequency. This is due to rate limits imposed by Zapier and the apps you use, which restrict the number of API requests you can make within a specific time frame.
NoteZapier rate limits and app rate limits are separate. Zapier controls how often your Zaps can run, while each third-party app enforces its own API limits. If you see an error, check whether the message references Zapier or the app to determine the source.
Instant triggers
Zaps with instant triggers will encounter 429 errors if they exceed 20,000 requests every 5 minutes per user.
Polling triggers
The number of records that a polling trigger returns per poll is determined by the app. For example, an app may be designed to only retrieve the 100 most recent events, or only retrieve events created within the last 24 hours.
If you’re on a Free or trial Zapier plan, Zaps with polling triggers will be held if they exceed 200 requests every 10 minutes per Zap. Held runs are paused. You can replay them once the limit resets.
Apps
Each app on Zapier has its own API limits and throttling mechanism. An app's rate limit is shared across all Zaps in your account. If you are using an app’s API heavily, you may need to contact the app to increase your usage.
Information about rate limits can be found in the Zapier Help Center by looking for an app’s “How to Get Started” article or in the app’s API documentation.
Learn more about rate limits for:
To differentiate between an app error and a Zapier error, look for “Zapier” in the error message.
Private apps
Private app rate limits are based on the private app owner’s current Zapier plan. When using private apps, Zap runs will be held if they exceed the following limits:
- Free and Professional plans: 100 requests every 60 seconds.
- Team and Enterprise plans: 5,000 requests every 60 seconds.
To increase your private app rate limit, you must reach out to your private app owner. The private app owner is likely the developer who shared access to the private app with you.
Flood protection
Flood protection is a way for Zapier to limit how many new events can be sent through your Zap to ensure the system works efficiently.
Instant triggers
Instant triggers are not subject to flood protection, as each item is sent to the trigger individually. Some exceptions include Google Sheets and Google Calendar "New Event" and "Updated Event" instant triggers, which use both webhook and polling techniques.
Polling triggers
For Zaps that use polling triggers, if you have 100+ events that trigger a Zap at once, Zapier will hold them for you. Flood protection counts all incoming trigger items before any Filter or Path steps run. Even if most items would be filtered out, the initial count can still activate flood protection.
You will receive an email requesting you to confirm these actions should run. This helps to prevent a large number of actions from running by mistake and protects your task limit.
Once you confirm they should run, you can use the Replay feature to let them continue. Zapier processes these replayed Zap runs at a rate of 1 per second. For example, 1,000 Zap runs will take a little over 15 minutes to complete. If you do not want these Zap runs to continue, you can delete them.
To ensure your Zaps aren't stopped by your apps' rate limits, Zapier may also spread out groups of tasks that trigger all at once.
Learn how to adjust the flood protection limit in your Zap.
What do I do if I exceed a rate limit?
You can:
- Replay the Zap run. This will retry the steps in your affected Zap runs.
- Add a Delay After Queue step to your Zap, which pauses actions for a specific time before running them. This will spread out the rate at which the Zap runs those actions.
- Adjust the flood protection limit in your Zap. You must have a paid Zapier plan.
- Enable pay-per-task billing to continue running Zaps beyond your plan's included tasks.
- Upgrade your plan for a higher monthly task allowance.
Two-way syncing
Zapier does not support two-way syncing between apps. Zaps are one-way workflows.
In certain scenarios, you can imitate two-way syncing by setting up two different Zaps that perform opposite actions. For instance, you could have one Zap that creates a new spreadsheet row for every new contact created and another that creates a new contact for every new spreadsheet row. If you attempt this, be careful not to create a Zap loop — where Zaps run over and over again from the same data, quickly using up your plan tasks. Learn how to avoid Zap loops.