Aider error
Aider: The API provider has rate limited you
The API provider has rate limited you. Try again later or check your quotas.Status: By designLast verified 1 documented fix3 sources
What it means
The provider returned a litellm RateLimitError. Aider treats this as retryable: it prints the raw error, this description, and "Retrying in N seconds...", doubling the delay each time. It gives up once the delay goes past RETRY_TIMEOUT (60 seconds).
Causes
- Your account hit the provider's rate limit or quota (aider's exception description).
How to fix it
- Fix 1.
Wait for aider's automatic retries, try again later, or check your quotas with the provider.
More Aider errors
All 17 Aider errorsThe LLM did not conform to the edit format.Status: WorkaroundSearchReplaceNoExactMatch: This SEARCH block failed to exactly match lines in {path}Status: WorkaroundModel gpt-3.5-turbo has hit a token limit!Status: WorkaroundModel foobar: Unknown context window size and costs, using sane defaults.Status: By designModel azure/gpt-4-turbo: Missing these environment variables:Status: By designaider: The term 'aider' is not recognized as a name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or executable program. Check the spelling of the name, or if a path was included, verify that the path is correct and try again.Status: Workaroundaider-chat 0.23.0 requires somepackage==X.Y.Z, but you have somepackage U.W.V which is incompatible.Status: WorkaroundThe API provider is not able to authenticate you. Check your API key.Status: By design
Related reading
- Aider vs Claude Code in 2026: Git-First Open Source vs Subagent RuntimeAider vs Claude Code: git-first, model-agnostic Aider against the Claude Code runtime of subagents and hooks. Compare architecture, cost, governance and fit.
- Aider vs Claude Code: Open Source vs Commercial AI Coding CLIAider is open source and works with any model. Claude Code is Anthropic's commercial agent. Here is how they compare for TypeScript.
FAQ
What does "The API provider has rate limited you" mean in Aider?
The provider returned a litellm RateLimitError. Aider treats this as retryable: it prints the raw error, this description, and "Retrying in N seconds...", doubling the delay each time. It gives up once the delay goes past RETRY_TIMEOUT (60 seconds).
How do I fix "The API provider has rate limited you"?
Wait for aider's automatic retries, try again later, or check your quotas with the provider.
Is this Aider error fixed?
Status: By design. Expected behavior, not a bug. The documented fixes change the setup that triggers it. Affected versions: All versions that use litellm exception mapping.
Sources
Last verified against 3 sources: official docs, maintainer replies and release notes.
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