Reddit API Pricing in 2026: Free Tier, Paid Rates and a No-Key Alternative

Reddit API pricing has three parts in 2026: a free tier with a fixed rate limit, a published paid rate from 2023 for heavy use, and a separate agreement for anything commercial. This guide puts the official numbers in one table, works through the cost of 1 million calls, and explains when the official API is the right tool and when a scraper that reads public posts is simpler.

Every number about Reddit below comes from Reddit’s own pages, linked where it appears. Reddit can change its limits and fees at any time (Data API Terms, sections 2.9 and 3.1), so check the source before you commit a budget.

Reddit API pricing at a glance

Access level	Price	Rate limit	Needs approval	Who it suits
Free, with OAuth	Free	100 queries per minute per OAuth client ID	No separate agreement for permitted non-commercial use	Personal scripts, bots, moderator tools, non-commercial research
Free, without OAuth	Free	10 queries per minute	No	Quick tests only
Higher usage (published 2023 rate)	$0.24 per 1,000 API calls	Above the free limits, by agreement	Yes	Third-party apps with large traffic
Commercial use	Set by Reddit	By agreement	Yes, a separate agreement	Products, data resale, AI training, commercial monitoring

Sources: the free limits and the $0.24 rate come from Reddit’s Key Facts on the API update (both effective July 1, 2023). The approval rules come from the Data API Terms, last revised July 20, 2026, and the Developer Terms, last revised March 24, 2026.

Reddit keeps its current developer details on the Reddit Data API Wiki in its help center. That page refused our automated request when we wrote this guide, so we could not confirm whether it lists newer figures. Read it before you build.

Is the Reddit API free?

For most small projects, yes. Reddit says more than 98% of apps do not pay and keep free access “so long as apps are not monetized and are below our published data-usage threshold” (Key Facts). The same page says access stays free for:

• non-commercial researchers and academics under the usage threshold,
• moderator tools and bots.

The free tier is not a free commercial licence. The Data API Terms (section 3.1) say that if you want to use the Data APIs “for commercial purposes, research in excess of rate limits, or for any use that is not expressly permitted,” you need a separate agreement with Reddit. Section 3.2 adds that you may not sell API access or derive revenue from it without Reddit’s express written approval.

Reddit API cost: the paid rate

Reddit’s only public per-call price is $0.24 per 1,000 API calls, effective July 1, 2023, “for third-party apps that require higher usage limits” (Key Facts). Reddit describes this as enterprise pricing and says it is “based on usage levels comparable to our own costs.”

We could not find a newer public rate card on Reddit’s pages. The Data API Terms say Reddit “reserves the right to charge fees for future use or access to the Data APIs, rates to be determined at Reddit’s sole discretion.” In practice, commercial pricing is whatever your agreement with Reddit says.

Worked example: 1 million calls a month

Suppose your app makes 1 million API calls a month.

1. Does it fit the free rate limit? At 100 queries per minute, 1 million calls take 10,000 minutes, which is about 6.9 days of non-stop requests. A 30-day month has 43,200 minutes, so the free limit allows up to 4.32 million calls a month if you spread them evenly. On volume alone, 1 million calls fit.
2. Is the use permitted for free? This is the real test. If the app is monetized or the use is commercial, the free tier does not cover it, whatever the volume.
3. What would it cost at the published rate? 1,000,000 calls divided by 1,000, times $0.24, is $240 a month. At 10 million calls it would be $2,400.

Two things change this maths. Reddit can review an app after it hits rate limits (Developer Terms, App Review), and registering several apps for one use case to get more quota is forbidden by the same terms. Plan for one client ID per use case.

What changed since 2023

• June 19, 2023: new Data API Terms took effect, together with the Developer Terms.
• July 1, 2023: free limits set at 100 queries per minute with OAuth and 10 without, and the $0.24 per 1,000 calls rate started for apps that need more.
• July 5, 2023: Reddit limited access to mature content through the Data API.
• Since then: both sets of terms have been revised. The current Developer Terms (March 24, 2026) let Reddit require App Review “at any time,” and the current Data API Terms (July 20, 2026) say User Content may not be used to train a machine learning or AI model without the express permission of the rightsholders.

Each of these dates comes from the Key Facts page and the two terms pages linked above.

Reddit API access: when you need the official API

Use the official API, through your own Reddit app and OAuth, when you need any of these:

• Posting or writing data: submitting posts, commenting, voting, sending messages or editing a wiki.
• Bots and moderator tools: Reddit names these as free uses of the Data API.
• Acting for a logged-in user: reading a user’s subscriptions or inbox needs user authorization through OAuth.
• A formal licence: if your legal team needs a contract with Reddit for commercial use, only Reddit can give you that.

For these cases a scraper is the wrong tool. Our Reddit Actors only read public pages and cannot post, vote or log in. To set up the official route, see our guide on how to get a Reddit API key.

When a scraper fits better

Many teams do not need to write to Reddit at all. They want to read public posts and comments for research, brand monitoring or lead finding. For that, a pay-per-result scraper avoids the app registration, the OAuth code and the rate-limit bookkeeping. You pay per row you receive, not per call.

Our three Reddit Actors run on the Apify platform. You need an Apify account, but no Reddit account and no Reddit API key. Prices below are the Store prices on the day we wrote this; the cards at the end of the page always show the current ones.

Actor	What it returns	Free plan	Starter	Scale	Business
Reddit Scraper	Posts and comments from subreddits, search and post links	$1.50	$1.20	$1.10	$1.00
Reddit Comments Scraper	Comment threads, with keyword and score filters	$1.50	$1.20	$1.10	$1.00
Reddit Keyword Monitor	New posts that mention your keywords, with a snippet	$3.50	$2.40	$2.35	$2.30

Prices are per 1,000 results (posts, comments or mentions). Your Apify plan sets the column. Each run also has a start fee of $0.05 per 1,000 runs per GB of memory.

What each one does, from its documentation:

• Reddit Scraper collects posts with score, upvote ratio, comment count, flair and author, and full comment threads with depth and parent. It takes up to 10,000 posts per subreddit or search and up to 10,000 comments per post. An “only new posts” mode turns a scheduled run into a daily monitor.
• Reddit Comments Scraper returns one row per comment, plus the post it belongs to. You can keep only comments that contain your words or reach a minimum score, and filtered-out comments are not charged.
• Reddit Keyword Monitor returns only new posts that mention your brand or keyword, with where it matched and a snippet. Loosely related posts that it skips are not charged.

Comparing the two cost models

The official API charges per call and our Actors charge per result, so compare them on your own workload. If you qualify for free API access and only need a few thousand calls a day, the official API is cheaper: it costs nothing. A scraper makes sense when you do not want to build and maintain OAuth code, when you need a scheduled monitor without running your own server, or when you want ready rows in JSON, CSV or Excel. For 100,000 posts and comments a month, the Reddit Scraper costs $120 on the Starter plan.

Whichever route you choose, follow Reddit’s terms and data protection law. Usernames are personal data in many places, for example under GDPR.

How to choose

1. You need to post, vote, moderate or act for users: use the official API.
2. You are a non-commercial researcher or hobbyist within the limits: use the free API.
3. You run a commercial product on Reddit data: contact Reddit about an agreement.
4. You only need to read public posts and comments, in rows, on a schedule: a pay-per-result scraper is usually the faster setup.