Speed and price

Every API in the catalog can be served by more than one source. By default AnyAPI picks the cheapest one that can serve your request, and falls back to the next if it fails. On many APIs the cheapest source is not the fastest, and the gap is large. Use preferLatencyUnderMs when waiting costs you more than the price difference does.

The default: cheapest serves

Send nothing and routing is unchanged. The cheapest source serves, and you are charged its price. This is the behavior every API has always had, and it stays the behavior for every request that omits the field.

Prefer a faster source

Add preferLatencyUnderMs to the request body, in milliseconds:

{ "handle": "zachking", "preferLatencyUnderMs": 1000 }

AnyAPI then orders the sources for your request like this:

Sources whose published median response time is under your target go first, and the cheapest of those serves.
If none is that fast, the request is still served, by whichever source offers the best speed for its price.
Sources we have not timed are tried last.

Your request is never refused for being slow. The field is a preference, not a filter: it changes the order sources are tried in, and removes none of them, so failover works exactly as it does without it.

It can cost more

This is the trade you are making. When the cheapest source misses your target, a faster and dearer one serves, and you are quoted and charged its price. You can see the difference before you call, without a key. GET /catalog publishes each source’s pricing next to health.latencyP50Ms, and that median is exactly the number routing reads:

curl -s https://api.getanyapi.com/catalog \
  | jq '.apis[] | select(.slug=="tiktok.profile") | .lanes[]
        | {source: .source.name, per1k: .pricing.maxPer1kUsd, medianMs: .health.latencyP50Ms}'

{ "source": "Badger",  "per1k": 0.9, "medianMs": 10806 }
{ "source": "Tiger",   "per1k": 1.2, "medianMs": 476 }
{ "source": "Giraffe", "per1k": 2,   "medianMs": null }

Reading that: with no preference, Badger serves at

0.0009 a call and a ~10.8 second median. With `preferLatencyUnderMs: 1000`, Tiger serves at

0.0012 and a ~0.5 second median, so you pay 33% more and wait about a twentieth as long. Giraffe has no median published, so it sorts last under a preference. A target that no source beats costs you nothing extra, because the ordering you get is the cheapest-first one you already had.

The median describes past requests. It is not a ceiling on yours, and it excludes any waiting your own request asks for, such as a waitFor on a page render. Treat it as an observation, not a deadline.

When it does nothing

The field is accepted on every API and is a no-op in three cases, so you can send it without special-casing your code:

Case	What happens
The API has one source	Nothing to reorder; that source serves
We have not timed the sources	They keep their normal cheapest-first order
Page 2 and later of a paginated walk	The first page picks the source and its price, and the rest of the walk stays there

The pagination rule follows from how cursors work: a cursor pins the walk to one source so your pages stay consistent. See Pagination.

Example

import requests

response = requests.post(
    "https://api.getanyapi.com/v1/run/tiktok.profile",
    headers={"X-API-Key": "YOUR_ANYAPI_KEY"},
    json={"handle": "zachking", "preferLatencyUnderMs": 1000},
    timeout=60,
)
result = response.json()
print(result["costUsd"], result["output"]["data"]["followers"])

const response = await fetch("https://api.getanyapi.com/v1/run/tiktok.profile", {
  method: "POST",
  headers: {
    "X-API-Key": "YOUR_ANYAPI_KEY",
    "Content-Type": "application/json",
  },
  body: JSON.stringify({ handle: "zachking", preferLatencyUnderMs: 1000 }),
});

const result = await response.json();
console.log(result.costUsd, result.output.data.followers);

curl -s -X POST https://api.getanyapi.com/v1/run/tiktok.profile \
  -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_ANYAPI_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"handle":"zachking","preferLatencyUnderMs":1000}'

The costUsd on the response is what you were actually charged, so compare it across a call with and without the field to see the trade in your own numbers.

Getting Started

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API Reference

Speed and price

The default: cheapest serves

Prefer a faster source

It can cost more

When it does nothing

Example

​The default: cheapest serves

​Prefer a faster source

​It can cost more

​When it does nothing

​Example

The default: cheapest serves

Prefer a faster source

It can cost more

When it does nothing

Example