It Is All About No Limitations With The Enterprise API Plans

I am continuing to push forward my API plans research, where I look closely at the common building blocks of the service composition, pricing, and plans available for some of the leading API providers out there. I have no less than ten separate stories derived from Algolia, the search API provider's, pricing page--I will be using Algolia as a reference for how to plan your API, along with elder API pioneers like Amazon, and Twilio, for some time now.

On area of Algolia's approach I think is worth noting, is the enterprise level of their operations. They provide the most detail regarding what you get as part of the enterprise tier, being very public about their operations, in a way you just do not see with many API providers. When it comes down to it, the Algolia enterprise search plans are all about no limitations--I think their description says it well:

Your own dedicated infrastructure. Don't like limits? Meet our dedicated clusters. Optimal for high volumes of data, they scale to thousands of queries per second. Search performance and indexing times have never been so good.

The basic building blocks of how Algolia is monetizing their search API, records and operation API calls, melt away at the enterprise level. The lower four plans for Algolia API access meter the number of record, and operation API calls you make, and charge consumers, using four separate pricing levels. If you are an enterprise customer, the need for this metering melts away, eliminating the default limitations applied to lower levels of API consumption.

I support more transparency in enterprise API plans, as well as other partner tiers of access. I do not think Algolia's approach to delivering enterprise services is unique, but their straightforward, simple, and transparent approach to doing it is. In an API driven world, the enterprise levels of access do not always have to be that age old mating dance, that involves smoke and mirrors, and pricing pulled out of a magic hat--it can be just be about reducing the limitations around retail levels of API access, and getting business done.