Limiter
Dead simple rate limit middleware for Go.
- Simple API
- "Store" approach for backend
- Redis support (but not tied too)
- Middlewares: HTTP, FastHTTP and Gin
Installation
Using Go Modules
$ go get github.com/ulule/limiter/[email protected]
Usage
In five steps:
- Create a
limiter.Rateinstance (the number of requests per period) - Create a
limiter.Storeinstance (see Redis or In-Memory) - Create a
limiter.Limiterinstance that takes store and rate instances as arguments - Create a middleware instance using the middleware of your choice
- Give the limiter instance to your middleware initializer
Example:
// Create a rate with the given limit (number of requests) for the given
// period (a time.Duration of your choice).
import "github.com/ulule/limiter/v3"
rate := limiter.Rate{
Period: 1 * time.Hour,
Limit: 1000,
}
// You can also use the simplified format "<limit>-<period>"", with the given
// periods:
//
// * "S": second
// * "M": minute
// * "H": hour
// * "D": day
//
// Examples:
//
// * 5 reqs/second: "5-S"
// * 10 reqs/minute: "10-M"
// * 1000 reqs/hour: "1000-H"
// * 2000 reqs/day: "2000-D"
//
rate, err := limiter.NewRateFromFormatted("1000-H")
if err != nil {
panic(err)
}
// Then, create a store. Here, we use the bundled Redis store. Any store
// compliant to limiter.Store interface will do the job. The defaults are
// "limiter" as Redis key prefix and a maximum of 3 retries for the key under
// race condition.
import "github.com/ulule/limiter/v3/drivers/store/redis"
store, err := redis.NewStore(client)
if err != nil {
panic(err)
}
// Alternatively, you can pass options to the store with the "WithOptions"
// function. For example, for Redis store:
import "github.com/ulule/limiter/v3/drivers/store/redis"
store, err := redis.NewStoreWithOptions(pool, limiter.StoreOptions{
Prefix: "your_own_prefix",
})
if err != nil {
panic(err)
}
// Or use a in-memory store with a goroutine which clears expired keys.
import "github.com/ulule/limiter/v3/drivers/store/memory"
store := memory.NewStore()
// Then, create the limiter instance which takes the store and the rate as arguments.
// Now, you can give this instance to any supported middleware.
instance := limiter.New(store, rate)
// Alternatively, you can pass options to the limiter instance with several options.
instance := limiter.New(store, rate, limiter.WithTrustForwardHeader(true), limiter.WithIPv6Mask(mask))
// Finally, give the limiter instance to your middleware initializer.
import "github.com/ulule/limiter/v3/drivers/middleware/stdlib"
middleware := stdlib.NewMiddleware(instance)
See middleware examples:
How it works
The ip address of the request is used as a key in the store.
If the key does not exist in the store we set a default value with an expiration period.
You will find two stores:
- Redis: rely on TTL and incrementing the rate limit on each request.
- In-Memory: rely on a fork of go-cache with a goroutine to clear expired keys using a default interval.
When the limit is reached, a 429 HTTP status code is sent.
Why Yet Another Package
You could ask us: why yet another rate limit package?
Because existing packages did not suit our needs.
We tried a lot of alternatives:
-
Throttled. This package uses the generic cell-rate algorithm. To cite the documentation: "The algorithm has been slightly modified from its usual form to support limiting with an additional quantity parameter, such as for limiting the number of bytes uploaded". It is brillant in term of algorithm but documentation is quite unclear at the moment, we don't need burst feature for now, impossible to get a correct
After-Retry(when limit exceeds, we can still make a few requests, because of the max burst) and it only supportshttp.Handlermiddleware (we use Gin). Currently, we only need to return429andX-Ratelimit-*headers forn reqs/duration. -
Speedbump. Good package but maybe too lightweight. No
Resetsupport, only one middleware for Gin framework and too Redis-coupled. We rather prefer to use a "store" approach. -
Tollbooth. Good one too but does both too much and too little. It limits by remote IP, path, methods, custom headers and basic auth usernames... but does not provide any Redis support (only in-memory) and a ready-to-go middleware that sets
X-Ratelimit-*headers.tollbooth.LimitByRequest(limiter, r)only returns an HTTP code. -
ratelimit. Probably the closer to our needs but, once again, too lightweight, no middleware available and not active (last commit was in August 2014). Some parts of code (Redis) comes from this project. It should deserve much more love.
There are other many packages on GitHub but most are either too lightweight, too old (only support old Go versions) or unmaintained. So that's why we decided to create yet another one.
Contributing
Don't hesitate ;)
