X / Twitter API
X API Basic costs $100/month. Pro costs $5,000/month. If you're building a social media product, that's just the X slice. Here's the full X API breakdown — and how Aether handles Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Threads, and Reddit without per-platform API fees.
X restructured its API pricing significantly in 2023. The free tier is effectively unusable for building a product. The price jump from Basic to Pro is a 50× increase with no middle tier.
| Tier | Price | Write limit | Read limit | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0/mo | 500 posts/month | 1 app login only | Effectively no API access for building products |
| Basic | $100/mo | 3,000 posts/month | 10,000 posts/month (read) | Minimum viable for small-scale developer projects |
| Pro | $5,000/mo | 300,000 posts/month | 1,000,000 posts/month (read) | 50× price jump from Basic with 100× write increase |
| Enterprise | Custom | Custom | Custom | Sales-negotiated — no public pricing |
Note: X API pricing has changed multiple times since 2023. Verify current rates at developer.x.com before building.
| Limit | Value | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Free write | 500 posts/month | ~16 posts/day |
| Basic write | 3,000 posts/month | ~100 posts/day |
| Pro write | 300,000 posts/month | ~10,000 posts/day |
| Tweet length | 280 chars (free) / 25,000 chars (Premium) | Blue subscribers get longer posts |
| Media upload | 5MB image / 512MB video | Video max 2:20 at 40fps |
| Rate limit window | 15-minute windows | Most endpoints reset every 15 min |
| App-level rate limit | Per endpoint, per app | Separate from user-level limits |
| Code | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 187 | Status is a duplicate — same tweet posted recently |
| 226 | Request looks automated; suspicious activity detected |
| 261 | Application cannot perform write actions |
| 326 | Account locked — too many failed logins or suspicious activity |
| 32 | Authentication token could not be validated |
| 88 | Rate limit exceeded — wait for window reset |
| 89 | Invalid or expired access token |
| 135 | Timestamp out of bounds — clock skew issue |
X is one platform. Most social media products need 3–7. Aether covers Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Threads, and Reddit under one API key and one bill — no separate OAuth apps, no separate API subscriptions, no per-platform rate limit tracking in your code.
Aether does not currently support X/Twitter. If your product requires X, you'll manage that separately via the X API. Aether handles everything else.
import Aether from "aether";
// Aether handles Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook,
// YouTube, Threads, and Reddit — no per-platform API billing.
// X/Twitter requires a separate X API subscription at $100–$5,000/mo.
const aether = new Aether({ apiKey: process.env.AETHER_API_KEY });
// Post to 6 platforms in one call — no separate API fees
const post = await aether.posts.create({
text: "Launching today — the social media API that doesn't charge per platform 🚀",
profileIds: [
"ig_abc123", // Instagram
"tt_xyz789", // TikTok
"li_company789", // LinkedIn
"fb_page456", // Facebook
"th_user456", // Threads
"rd_user789", // Reddit
],
scheduledFor: "2026-06-15T09:00:00Z",
});import os
import aether
client = aether.Aether(api_key=os.environ["AETHER_API_KEY"])
# All 7 platforms, one API key, no per-platform billing
post = client.posts.create(
text="Launching today — the social media API that doesn't charge per platform 🚀",
profile_ids=[
"ig_abc123",
"tt_xyz789",
"li_company789",
"fb_page456",
"th_user456",
"rd_user789",
],
scheduled_for="2026-06-15T09:00:00Z",
)# Post to 6 platforms — no separate API subscriptions
curl -X POST https://api.aetherhq.dev/v1/posts \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $AETHER_API_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"text": "Launching today — the social media API that doesn't charge per platform 🚀",
"profileIds": [
"ig_abc123",
"tt_xyz789",
"li_company789",
"fb_page456",
"th_user456",
"rd_user789"
],
"scheduledFor": "2026-06-15T09:00:00Z"
}'7 platforms · one API key · free to start
Get your free API keyX API has four tiers: Free ($0 — extremely limited, ~500 posts/month), Basic ($100/month — 3,000 posts/month), Pro ($5,000/month — 300,000 posts/month), and Enterprise (custom pricing). The jump from Basic to Pro is 50×, making it very expensive to scale. Most developers building social media products find the pricing prohibitive for anything beyond minimal X integration.
Rate limits vary by tier and endpoint. On Basic ($100/mo), you can write 3,000 posts/month (~100/day) and read 10,000 posts/month. On Pro ($5,000/mo), write limits jump to 300,000/month. Most endpoints use 15-minute rolling windows. Error code 88 means you've hit a rate limit. Error 261 means your app doesn't have write permissions.
The Free tier technically allows posting, but is limited to ~500 posts/month (about 16/day) and only 1 user authentication. In practice, it's not viable for building a product. The minimum useful tier for developers is Basic at $100/month.
Aether currently focuses on Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Threads, and Reddit — the seven platforms where most developer social media API demand is concentrated. X/Twitter is not currently supported. If your strategy requires X alongside other platforms, you would manage X separately via the X API while using Aether for the other 7.
Aether is a unified social media API covering Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Threads, and Reddit under one API key with usage-based pricing — no separate platform subscriptions. You pay for usage, not for the number of platforms you connect. X/Twitter is excluded and requires a separate X API subscription.
Instagram · TikTok · LinkedIn · Facebook · YouTube · Threads · Reddit. Free tier, no credit card required.
Get your free API key →