# Questions about limit\_req\_zone, what's the difference between rate= and burst=

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/questions-about-limit-req-zone-whats-the-difference-between-rate-and-burst/221553>\
**Category:** NGINX\
**Created:** [July 19, 2012, 9:35am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/questions-about-limit-req-zone-whats-the-difference-between-rate-and-burst/221553 "2012-07-19T09:35:02Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![aris](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/258eb7/32.png) [@aris](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/aris)\
**Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 9:35am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/questions-about-limit-req-zone-whats-the-difference-between-rate-and-burst/221553/1 "2012-07-19T09:35:02Z")

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Hi All,

According to NGINX wiki,

limit\_req\_zone $binary\_remote\_addr zone=one:10m rate=1r/s;

```
server {
    location /search/ {
        limit_req zone=one burst=5;
    }

```

means allows a user no more than 1 request per second on average, with  
bursts of no more than 5 requests.

But what’s the difference between rate= and burst=?  
For example,

limit\_req\_zone $binary\_remote\_addr zone=one:10m rate=1r/s;  
limit\_req zone=one burst=5;

limit\_req\_zone $binary\_remote\_addr zone=one:10m rate=5r/s;  
limit\_req zone=one burst=1;

What’s the difference between above code? From my understanding, for  
both settings, users can establish no more than 6 requests at the same  
time.

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**Author:** ![fhal](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/f/ccd318/32.png) [@fhal](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/fhal)\
**Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 11:43am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/questions-about-limit-req-zone-whats-the-difference-between-rate-and-burst/221553/2 "2012-07-19T11:43:02Z")

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On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 03:34:09PM +0800, fhal wrote:

> limit\_req zone=one burst=1;
> 
> What’s the difference between above code? From my understanding, for both  
> settings, users can establish no more than 6 requests at the same time.

> **[Module ngx\_http\_limit\_req\_module](http://nginx.org/en/docs/http/ngx_http_limit_req_module.html)**

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**Author:** ![fhal](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/f/ccd318/32.png) [@fhal](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/fhal)\
**Post date:** [July 20, 2012, 4:23am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/questions-about-limit-req-zone-whats-the-difference-between-rate-and-burst/221553/3 "2012-07-20T04:23:01Z")

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Hello All:

We have an issue where I need to increase the proxy\_read\_timeout to a  
large value. Currently its 300s. What is the the maximum supported  
value ?

I am running nginx 1.0.5, could I be able to manually compile a larger  
value in ?

snippit of conf  
listen 10.222.3.88:80;  
server\_name localhost;  
client\_max\_body\_size 2500m;  
proxy\_read\_timeout 300;  
proxy\_connect\_timeout 75;  
keepalive\_timeout 75;

Regards  
Duane

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![fhal](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/f/ccd318/32.png) [@fhal](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/fhal)\
**Post date:** [July 20, 2012, 11:57am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/questions-about-limit-req-zone-whats-the-difference-between-rate-and-burst/221553/4 "2012-07-20T11:57:40Z")

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Hello!

On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 10:22:22PM -0400, Duane M. wrote:

> We have an issue where I need to increase the proxy\_read\_timeout to a  
> large value. Currently its 300s. What is the the maximum supported  
> value ?

Supported values are up to 24 days.

Maxim D.