I've been using Mapbox for my website, and I recently had a bad experience with some unexpected charges. My friend jokingly added a for loop to multiple Mapbox API calls using Chrome dev tools, and I ended up with an $82 bill in just one day! I'm trying to figure out the best way to prevent this kind of incident in the future. Do I need to set up a middleware to proxy my requests to Mapbox to effectively rate limit them? Is there a better solution? If I go the proxy route, will it complicate things, especially with Mapbox GL JS?
5 Answers
Yeah, big companies like Mapbox often don’t place usage limits, so any mistakes just mean more profit for them. It might be wise to keep sensitive API keys hidden on the backend to avoid these situations entirely. Just remember, security first!
What you experienced is a type of DOW attack—Denial of Wallet! It’s frustrating that so many services require payment per request. We had to build custom solutions where all requests go through our servers just to avoid spam from competitors.
I manage a high-traffic site and ran into similar issues. I switched from Mapbox to MapLibre (an open-source version) combined with other tile providers like Maptiler or OpenFreeMaps. This drastically cut down my costs while maintaining quality. This might be worth considering for your project!
So just to clarify, using MapLibre with a different tile provider would save money compared to using it with Mapbox tiles, right?
Exactly! Just make sure to check the licensing terms first.
You might want to consider using a proxy server for your API calls. A serverless function through something like Cloudflare could handle rate limiting nicely. But honestly, any scalable backend solution can do the trick! Plus, you can add caching there to reduce unnecessary calls. Just be careful with how you instantiate your maps with this setup!
True! Caching can definitely help keep costs down too!
Good point! I bet they don’t necessarily need a huge service like Cloudflare for this, but it's definitely a reliable option.
It’s always a good laugh until it isn’t, huh? Just remember, preventing those unexpected charges is crucial! Being cautious with your API calls can save you a ton in the long run. Just ensure all calls go through a proper proxy and watch those limits!
Lol for real! But seriously, it could've ended up being way worse!
It’s unbelievable how common this is getting!