Mistral Rate Limits

Overview

Rate limit management for Mistral AI API. Mistral enforces per-workspace RPM (requests/minute) and TPM (tokens/minute) limits that vary by usage tier (Experiment free tier vs Scale pay-as-you-go). View your workspace limits at admin.mistral.ai/plateforme/limits.

Prerequisites

• Mistral API key configured
• Understanding of workspace tier (Experiment vs Scale)
• Application with retry infrastructure

Mistral Rate Limit Architecture

Limits are set at the workspace level, not per key. All API keys in a workspace share the same RPM/TPM budget.

Headers returned on every response:

• x-ratelimit-limit-requests — your RPM cap
• x-ratelimit-remaining-requests — remaining RPM
• x-ratelimit-limit-tokens — your TPM cap
• x-ratelimit-remaining-tokens — remaining TPM
• Retry-After — seconds to wait (on 429 only)

Instructions

Step 1: Token-Aware Rate Limiter

class MistralRateLimiter {
  private requestTimes: number[] = [];
  private tokenBuckets: Array<{ time: number; tokens: number }> = [];
  private readonly rpm: number;
  private readonly tpm: number;

  constructor(rpm: number, tpm: number) {
    this.rpm = rpm;
    this.tpm = tpm;
  }

  async waitIfNeeded(estimatedTokens: number): Promise<void> {
    const now = Date.now();
    const windowStart = now - 60_000;

    // Prune old entries
    this.requestTimes = this.requestTimes.filter(t => t > windowStart);
    this.tokenBuckets = this.tokenBuckets.filter(b => b.time > windowStart);

    // Check RPM
    if (this.requestTimes.length >= this.rpm) {
      const waitMs = this.requestTimes[0] - windowStart + 100;
      console.warn(`RPM limit (${this.rpm}), waiting ${waitMs}ms`);
      await new Promise(r => setTimeout(r, waitMs));
    }

    // Check TPM
    const currentTPM = this.tokenBuckets.reduce((sum, b) => sum + b.tokens, 0);
    if (currentTPM + estimatedTokens > this.tpm) {
      const waitMs = this.tokenBuckets[0].time - windowStart + 100;
      console.warn(`TPM limit (${this.tpm}), waiting ${waitMs}ms`);
      await new Promise(r => setTimeout(r, waitMs));
    }

    this.requestTimes.push(Date.now());
  }

  recordUsage(tokens: number): void {
    this.tokenBuckets.push({ time: Date.now(), tokens });
  }
}

Step 2: Retry with Retry-After Header

import { Mistral } from '@mistralai/mistralai';

async function chatWithRetry(
  client: Mistral,
  params: { model: string; messages: any[] },
  maxRetries = 5,
): Promise<any> {
  for (let attempt = 0; attempt <= maxRetries; attempt++) {
    try {
      return await client.chat.complete(params);
    } catch (error: any) {
      if (error.status !== 429 || attempt === maxRetries) throw error;

      // Respect Retry-After header from Mistral
      const retryAfter = error.headers?.get?.('retry-after');
      const waitSec = retryAfter ? parseInt(retryAfter) : Math.min(2 ** attempt, 60);
      console.warn(`429 — retrying in ${waitSec}s (attempt ${attempt + 1}/${maxRetries})`);
      await new Promise(r => setTimeout(r, waitSec * 1000));
    }
  }
}

Step 3: Rate-Limited Client Wrapper

const limiter = new MistralRateLimiter(100, 500_000);
const client = new Mistral({ apiKey: process.env.MISTRAL_API_KEY });

async function rateLimitedChat(messages: any[], model = 'mistral-small-latest') {
  const estimatedTokens = messages.reduce(
    (sum, m) => sum + Math.ceil((m.content?.length ?? 0) / 4), 0
  );

  await limiter.waitIfNeeded(estimatedTokens);
  const response = await client.chat.complete({ model, messages });

  if (response.usage) {
    limiter.recordUsage(
      (response.usage.promptTokens ?? 0) + (response.usage.completionTokens ?? 0)
    );
  }
  return response;
}

Step 4: Model Fallback for Throughput

class ModelRouter {
  private limiters: Record<string, MistralRateLimiter>;

  constructor() {
    this.limiters = {
      'mistral-large-latest': new MistralRateLimiter(30, 200_000),
      'mistral-small-latest': new MistralRateLimiter(120, 500_000),
    };
  }

  async chat(messages: any[], preferred = 'mistral-large-latest') {
    try {
      return await rateLimitedChat(messages, preferred);
    } catch (error: any) {
      if (error.status === 429 && preferred !== 'mistral-small-latest') {
        console.warn(`Falling back to mistral-small-latest`);
        return rateLimitedChat(messages, 'mistral-small-latest');
      }
      throw error;
    }
  }
}

Step 5: Batch Embedding with Rate Awareness

import time
from mistralai import Mistral

def batch_embed(client: Mistral, texts: list[str], batch_size: int = 32) -> list:
    """Batch embed with automatic rate limiting."""
    all_embeddings = []
    for i in range(0, len(texts), batch_size):
        batch = texts[i:i + batch_size]
        try:
            response = client.embeddings.create(
                model="mistral-embed", inputs=batch
            )
            all_embeddings.extend([d.embedding for d in response.data])
        except Exception as e:
            if hasattr(e, "status_code") and e.status_code == 429:
                time.sleep(10)
                response = client.embeddings.create(
                    model="mistral-embed", inputs=batch
                )
                all_embeddings.extend([d.embedding for d in response.data])
            else:
                raise
    return all_embeddings

Step 6: Usage Dashboard

function rateLimitStatus(limiter: MistralRateLimiter) {
  const now = Date.now();
  const windowStart = now - 60_000;
  const activeRequests = limiter['requestTimes'].filter(t => t > windowStart).length;
  const activeTokens = limiter['tokenBuckets']
    .filter(b => b.time > windowStart)
    .reduce((sum, b) => sum + b.tokens, 0);

  return {
    rpm: { used: activeRequests, limit: limiter['rpm'], pct: (activeRequests / limiter['rpm'] * 100).toFixed(1) },
    tpm: { used: activeTokens, limit: limiter['tpm'], pct: (activeTokens / limiter['tpm'] * 100).toFixed(1) },
  };
}

Error Handling

Examples

Absorb a burst without retry amplification

Place incoming chat work on the shared RPM/TPM queue and honor each server-provided retry delay before retrying a 429. If the queue age exceeds the product’s latency budget, return a retryable overload response for noncritical traffic instead of launching parallel retries that exhaust the workspace budget.

Resources

• Rate Limits & Usage Tiers
• Pricing
• Batch Inference — 50% cheaper, no rate limits

Output

• Token-aware rate limiter with RPM + TPM tracking
• Retry logic respecting Retry-After headers
• Model fallback routing for throughput
• Rate limit dashboard for monitoring