Azure Kubernetes Service · Rate Limits
Azure Kubernetes Service Rate Limits
AKS uses a token-bucket throttle on its resource provider APIs (control plane). Buckets have a fixed burst size and a sustained refill rate; throttled requests return HTTP 429 with Retry-After. Cluster-creation quotas are enforced per subscription per region, with subscription-type-specific defaults (EA 100, PAYG 10, Free Trial 3) and self-service raise paths in the Quotas blade.
16 Limits
Throttle: 429
ContainersKubernetesRate Limiting
Limits
LIST ManagedClusters (subscription) subscription
500
Burst 500; refill 1 request/second.
LIST ManagedClusters (resource group) resourceGroup
60
Burst 60; refill 1 request/second.
PUT AgentPool agentPool
20
Burst 20; refill 1 request/minute.
PUT ManagedCluster managedCluster
20
Burst 20; refill 1 request/minute.
GET ManagedCluster managedCluster
60
Burst 60; refill 1 request/second.
GET Operation Status subscription
200
Burst 200; refill 2 requests/second.
All Other AKS APIs subscription
60
Burst 60; refill 1 request/second.
AKS clusters per subscription per region (EA) subscription/region
100
Default for new EA subscriptions; max self-service 1,000.
AKS clusters per subscription per region (PAYG / CSP / MSDN) subscription/region
10
Default; max self-service 100.
AKS clusters per subscription per region (Free Trial) subscription/region
3
Hard cap; cannot be raised.
Maximum clusters per subscription globally subscription
5000
Maximum nodes per cluster (VMSS + Standard LB) cluster
5000
Maximum nodes per node pool nodePool
1000
Maximum node pools per cluster cluster
100
Maximum pods per node (Azure CNI) node
250
Maximum load-balanced services per cluster cluster
300
Policies
Token-bucket throttling
AKS RP APIs use token-bucket; burst then refill. 429 with Retry-After indicates the bucket is empty.
Backoff
Honor Retry-After (delay-seconds). Use exponential backoff with jitter; avoid bursty list-loops in retry logic.
Quota raise
Use the Azure portal Quotas page or REST API to request cluster quota increases. Free Trial subscriptions cannot raise quotas.
ManagedClusters and AgentPools tracked separately
Even within the same AKS cluster, ManagedClusters and AgentPools have independent buckets.