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Fair Usage Policy

Ably's Monthly Active User (MAU) packages are priced and designed around typical application usage. Over 98% of accounts never come close to a level of usage that Ably would consider atypical. For almost every account, this page is background reading rather than something that will affect your bill.

The principle

Ably bills based on MAUs because it scales naturally with your business, and you shouldn't be penalized for growing. The Fair Usage Policy exists purely to cover the small number of cases where an account's usage pattern doesn't reflect genuine application growth, so that Ably doesn't have to raise prices for everyone else to cover a handful of outliers.

When Ably might get in touch

Ably deliberately doesn't publish specific numeric limits for messages, connections, or channels under this policy, so that you build the application you actually need rather than building around a number. Instead, Ably looks at whether an account's overall usage pattern is a genuine, sustained outlier. Examples of what Ably looks for include:

  • Traffic that doesn't correspond to real, distinct users, such as automated processes or devices generating activity that inflates the MAU count without reflecting genuine usage.
  • Usage of one resource, such as messages or connection time, that is wildly disproportionate to usage of the others, compared to other applications on the same package.
  • A sudden, sustained shift in usage that doesn't correspond to business growth, seasonality, or a known change to your application.

This list isn't exhaustive, and none of it triggers anything automatically. Ably always looks at the whole picture for an account, not one metric in isolation. Over 98% of accounts never trigger any of this.

What happens if your account is an outlier

Ably will always talk to you first, before anything else happens to your account. This conversation is called a Fair Usage Review. From there, Ably works with you in good faith, typically over 30 days, to find the right path forward. That could be adjusting how your application uses Ably, moving to a different package, or agreeing a bespoke arrangement suited to your usage.

Ably's commitment to you

  • Ably will never suspend, restrict, or charge you extra under this policy without talking to you first.
  • Ably doesn't backdate charges based on this policy.
  • If you're on an annual Pro or Business package and you and Ably can't agree on a resolution together, Ably will refund the unused portion of your term and let you leave. There is no lock-in.

If you're not sure whether your use case fits, get in touch. Ably would rather have that conversation early than surprise you later.