Metric API limits and restricted attributes

This document describes data requirements for the Metric API, including:

Maximum limits
Restricted attributes

Maximum limits

The following default limits apply for all Metric data:

Condition	Limit
Age range for timestamp values	Metrics reported with a timestamp older than 48 hours ago or newer than 24 hours from the time they are reported are dropped.
Max data points per minute (DPM) See Additional account conditions.	1 million DPM
Max unique timeseries (cardinality) per account per day See Additional account conditions.	1 million A timeseries is a single, unique combination of a metric name and any attributes.
Max unique timeseries (cardinality) per metric name per day	100k
Max payloads per minute	100k
Max attributes per metric	100
Max metric attribute name length	255 characters
Max characters for an attribute key	255 characters
Max metric attribute value length	4096 characters
Allowed HTTP protocols	HTTPS only
Numerical long values falling outside minimum or maximum Java long values	Numerical long values that fall outside of the minimum or maximum Java long value will be rejected. If the number is in the common block, then the entire block will be dropped. If the number is in a metric data point, then the metric data point it resides in will be dropped.
Numerical double values falling outside minimum or maximum Java double values	Numeric double values that fall outside of a the minimum or maximum Java double value will be rejected. If the number is in the common block, then the entire block will be dropped. If the number is in a metric data point, then the metric data point it resides in will be dropped.
Payload size	Total maximum size or length: 1MB (10^6 bytes) maximum per POST. We highly recommend using compression.
Payload format	The payload must encoded as UTF-8.
Attribute naming syntax	Attribute names can be a combination of alphanumeric characters, colons (`:`), periods (`.`), and underscores (`_`).

The following default limits apply only to data collected via the Prometheus Remote Write integration:

Condition	Limit
Max unique Count and Summary timeseries (cardinality) per account per 5 minute interval See Additional account conditions.	1 million A timeseries is a single, unique combination of a metric name and any attributes. Timeseries received above this limit are dropped. This limit is enforced prior to and in addition to standard Metric limits.

Condition

Limit

Max unique Count and Summary timeseries (cardinality) per account per 5 minute interval

See Additional account conditions.

1 million

A timeseries is a single, unique combination of a metric name and any attributes. Timeseries received above this limit are dropped. This limit is enforced prior to and in addition to standard Metric limits.

Additional account conditions

Metric API limits apply at the individual account level. Trial and paid accounts receive a 1M DPM and 1M cardinality limit for trial purposes, but you can request up to 15M DPM and 15M cardinality for your account. To request changes to your metric rate limits, contact your New Relic account representative, or visit our Support portal.

Rate limit violations

This section describes how the Metric API behaves when you exceed the rate limits, and how to respond if limits are exceeded.

Data points per minute refers to the per minute rate at which individual metric values are sent to the Metric API.

When the maximum DPM limit is exceeded for an account, the New Relic Metric API returns a 429 response for the remainder of the minute. The response will include a Retry-After header indicating how long to wait in seconds before resubmitting or sending new data.

To resolve this issue, either reduce the number of data points you are sending, or request a rate limit change. Subsequent subscription changes do not impact modified rate limits. If an account change impacts your rate limit, you must notify us to adjust your rate limit.

To request rate limit changes, contact your New Relic account representative, or visit our Support portal.

A timeseries is a single, unique combination of a metric name and any attributes assigned to that metric. For example, if a CPU utilization metric with a single attribute hostname is sent from ten different hosts, this equals ten distinct values for the hostname attribute and ten unique metric timeseries.

If the per-account, per-day unique metric timeseries (cardinality) limit is exceeded during a 24 hour period, the endpoint will continue to receive and store raw metric data. However, New Relic will stop creating additional aggregate rollups (1 minute, 5 minutes, etc.) for the remainder of the 24 hour period. (These rollups are used used by default to query time windows longer than 60 minutes.)

You can continue to query your data when such a violation occurs by specifying a 60 minute or shorter time window or specifying the RAW keyword as described in view and query your metrics. This can be helpful in identifying potential causes for the violation.

If the per-metric name, per-day unique metric timeseries (cardinality) limit is exceeded during a 24 hour period, the endpoint will continue to receive and store raw metric data. However, New Relic will stop creating additional aggregate rollups (1 minute, 5 minutes, etc.) for the remainder of the 24 hour period. (These rollups are used used by default to query time windows longer than 60 minutes.)

If you make more than 100k POST requests to the Metric API endpoint within a minute, the endpoint will return a 429 response for the remainder of the minute. The response will include a Retry-After header indicating how long to wait in seconds before resubmitting or sending new data.

In general, if you reach this limit, consider creating larger payloads. To do this, combine more data points into each request to reduce the number of POSTs that are necessary.

If this is not an option, you can request a rate limit increase by contacting your New Relic account representative or visiting our Support portal.

Restricted attributes

These attributes are restricted by the New Relic platform. Any values submitted with these keys in the attributes section of a metric data point will cause the data point to be dropped, or the value to be omitted or overwritten:

Attribute	Description
`newrelic.source`	This resets to the value `metricAPI`.
`metricName`	This resets to the `name` value passed into each data point. This allows `name` to be an attribute key.
`endTimestamp`	`timestamp` and `interval.ms` will be converted to an `endTimestamp` for the data point.

These attributes are used internally to identify entities. Any values submitted with these keys in the attributes section of a metric data point may cause undefined behavior such as missing entities in the UI or telemetry not associating with the expected entities. For more information please refer to Entity synthesis:

Attribute	Description
`entity.guid`	Unique identifier assigned to an entity by New Relic.
`entity.name`	Human-readable name of an entity, often used to identify an entity in the UI.
`entity.type`	Used to differentiate between different types of entities, like hosts, applications, etc.

Additional restrictions include:

Restriction	Comments
Metric and attribute names	You cannot pass the same value for metric name and attribute name. In the following example, the metric is invalid because the metric is named `service.errors.all` and there is an attribute `service.errors.all`. Example: Metric value used as an attribute (invalid) `[ { "metrics": [ { "name": "service.errors.all", "type": "count", "value": 15, "timestamp": 1531414060739, "interval.ms": 10000, "attributes": { "service.response.statuscode": "400", "service.errors.all": "test", "service.name": "foo" } } ] } ]`
Reserved words	The Metric API inherits some reserved words from New Relic Insights, including `accountID`, `appId`, and `eventType`. Additionally, the syntax terms for NRQL are restricted unless you backtick (``) them. For a full list, see Reserved words: NRQL syntax terms.
Keys within metric JSON	All keys used within the metric JSON cannot be attribute keys. This includes `interval.ms`, `timestamp`, `value`, `common`, `min`, `max`, `count`, `sum`, and `metrics`. Exception: You can use `name` as an attribute key.

Restriction

Comments

Metric and attribute names

You cannot pass the same value for metric name and attribute name.

In the following example, the metric is invalid because the metric is named service.errors.all and there is an attribute service.errors.all.

Example: Metric value used as an attribute (invalid)

[
  {
    "metrics": [
      {
        "name": "service.errors.all",
        "type": "count",
        "value": 15,
        "timestamp": 1531414060739,
        "interval.ms": 10000,
        "attributes": {
          "service.response.statuscode": "400",
          "service.errors.all": "test",
          "service.name": "foo"
        }
      }
    ]
  }
]

Reserved words

The Metric API inherits some reserved words from New Relic Insights, including accountID, appId, and eventType. Additionally, the syntax terms for NRQL are restricted unless you backtick (``) them. For a full list, see Reserved words: NRQL syntax terms.

Keys within metric JSON

All keys used within the metric JSON cannot be attribute keys. This includes interval.ms, timestamp, value, common, min, max, count, sum, and metrics.

Exception: You can use name as an attribute key.

Metric API limits and restricted attributes

Maximum limits

Additional account conditions

Rate limit violations

Max data points per minute (DPM)

Max unique timeseries per account per day

Max unique timeseries per metric name per day

Max payloads per minute

Restricted attributes