Twitter announced a new API layer called Twitter API Pro for startups that costs $5,000 per month. The tier gives developers the ability to retrieve 1 million tweets per month, post 300,000 tweets per month, and access the full archive search endpoint.
The Elon Musk-led company announced the new pricing tiers in March. Earlier this year, Twitter announced that it will be closing access to its free API tier. However, it backed off that decision somewhat by offering 1,500 tweets per month free access for bots from content providers.
The new tier sits between the $100 per month base tier and the $42,000 per month enterprise tier. Twitter calls this new level suitable for “startups scaling their business.”
When Twitter announced the new pricing, many developers and founders argued that the company should introduce a middle tier between Basic and Enterprise for startups that can’t afford to spend nearly half a million dollars a year.
The new Pro API tier caters to some of those people, but it doesn’t offer a solution for businesses on tight budgets as they still have to pay $60,000 a year. For example, this new Pro tier placement limit could be enough for some bots, but it would be difficult for developers to raise money through subscriptions or donations to support the service for a long time.
Twitter, in particular, has not yet been developed a solution for researchers and academics. In March, the company said it was “looking at new ways” to serve that community, but the social network has yet to make an announcement.
Recently, Musk said at an event that Twitter was on “the comeback arc” after taking drastic measures to cut costs. Earlier this month, the company hired NBCU’s Linda Yaccarino as CEO of both Twitter and the ambitious “everything app X.”