Flight Alert API is a feature of AeroDataBox API that allows your system or application to receive near real-time notifications whenever information about a certain flight or flights gets updated. You create flight alert / web-hook subscriptions for flight numbers or airports, and our system sends updates to your web-hook endpoint as soon as there is a relevant update.
⚠️ January 31, 2026: Notice of the Major Update
We are transitioning Flight Alert API to a new credit-based billing system and changing how notification delivery retries work. If you are already using Flight Alert API, you need to adjust your code before the end of the transition period (April 4, 2026) to prevent service interruption. We kept necessary changes to a minimum. During this period, both billing systems will remain operational, permitting a smooth transition. Continue reading for further instructions.
Summary of Changes
We are now changing how billing and delivery retries operate for Flight Alert API.
OLD BEHAVIOR. Lifetime-based system. You pay for a single Tier 4 API call each time you create or refresh (renew) a flight alert subscription. Each subscription lasts only 7 days, so you must repeatedly make calls to keep your subscription alive. During that time, you receive unlimited alerts regardless of how many are generated — which could be thousands or zero.
Additionally, if there was an error delivering a flight alert notification for any reason, there will be 2 more retries.
NEW BEHAVIOR. Credit-based system. Creating flight alert subscriptions becomes free and subscriptions never expire. Instead, you maintain a dedicated credit balance within our API that is deducted each time an alert is sent and refilled every time you call a special API endpoint.
Retries are also changing. By default, the retries will be no more, unless you explicitly request them upon web-hook creation. You pay proportionally to the amount of notifications sent to your web-hooks (including retries).
| Aspect | Old / Lifetime-based | New / Credit-based |
|---|---|---|
| What you pay for | Subscription time (7-day blocks) | Each alert sent to you |
| Cost to create a flight alert subscription | 1 “Tier 4” API call (from 60 to 600 API units, depending on the pricing plan) | N/A |
| Cost to keep a flight alert subscription | 1 “Tier 4” API call every 7 days (from 60 to 600 API units, depending on the pricing plan) | N/A |
| Cost to refill credit balance | N/A | 1 API unit per 1 credit |
| Cost per alert | N/A | 1 credit per 1 flight notification delivery attempt |
| Unused value | Lost when subscription expires | Credits remain in your balance until used |
| Retries on Delivery Failure | 2 retries on each delivery failure | No retries by default, unless requested |
API Quota vs. Flight Alert Credit Balance
When using AeroDataBox API through the 3rd party API marketplaces (RapidAPI, API.Market), you will now deal with two billing concepts.
API Quota, expressed in units, is the monthly allowance of API calls included with your subscription plan on RapidAPI or API.Market. The amount of units consumed by a single API call is determined by a pricing tier which this endpoint belongs to (Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3, Tier 4). Your API quota is managed by the marketplace where you subscribed to our API, and not by us. Your quota renews each billing cycle.
Flight Alert Credit Balance, expressed in credits, is a dedicated balance exclusively for flight alerts. This balance is managed by us directly and not by the marketplace. It does not expire: you only refill it through the API when needed. At that moment units from your API quota get converted into flight alert credits.
Consuming Credits
Credits are deducted from your balance each time a notification is sent to your webhook.
The cost is 1 credit per 1 flight item in the notification.
If a notification contains 1 flight, it costs 1 credit. If a notification contains 5 flights (common with airport subscriptions), it costs 5 credits.
Credits are deducted when alerts are sent, not when delivered. If your endpoint is down, you are still charged for the send attempt.
If notification delivery fails due to your endpoint being down, due to being unable to respond within required timeout or due to responding with a non-2XX HTTP status code, our system may retry delivery up to 2 more times. While this was default behavior until now, to keep enjoying this feature for the new flight alert subscriptions, specifying a corresponding parameter is now required upon web-hook creation. Each delivery retry costs the same amount of credits as an initial delivery attempt.
Your flight alert balance is shared across all flight alert / web-hook subscriptions created by you. If your credit balance reaches zero, all flight subscriptions pause automatically until balance is refilled.
Refilling Credits
You add credits to your flight alert credit balance by calling the Credit Balance Refill Endpoint. In the request body, you specify how many credits you want to add. This is a variable-rate endpoint and the amount of API units deducted from your API quota depends on the amount of flight alerts credits requested.
The conversion rate is: 1 credit = 1 API unit.
Note that to be compatible with the API marketplaces, additional limits apply that determine how many credits you can add per single refill operation and how many total credits you can have on your balance at any given time. These limits depend on your pricing plan.
Technical Overview
This section gives a brief technical overview how to use the Flight Alert API with the new credit-based system. Note that this is just an overview and is NOT a replacement to the official documentation.
Endpoint: Create a Flight Alert Subscription
To create a flight alert subscription:
POST /subscriptions/webhook/{subjectType}/{subjectId}?useCredits=truePath parameters:
subjectType | Either FlightByNumber or FlightByAirportIcao |
subjectId | The flight number (e.g., KL1600) or airport ICAO code (e.g., EHAM) |
Request body:
{
"url": "https://your-endpoint.com/webhook",
"maxDeliveryRetries": 2 // Optional. Determines how many delivery retries to perform if delivery failed. Min = 0. Max = 2. Default is 0 (if ?useCredits=true), otherwise 2 until transition period ends.
}Pricing: Free (no API quota consumed) when using ?useCredits=true.
The flight alert subscription never expires. However, notifications will only be sent while you have a positive credit balance.
About ?useCredits=true:
During the transition period, include this query parameter to use the credit-based billing. Without it, the old billing model applies (Tier 4 charge, 7-day expiration). After the transition period ends, this parameter will be removed from the API and all new subscriptions will automatically use credits.
Endpoint: Refill Flight Alert Credit Balance
To add credits to your flight alert credit balance:
POST /subscriptions/balance/refillRequest body:
{
"credits": 500
}Pricing: Variable rate. API units consumed = credits requested
Endpoint: Check Flight Alert Credit Balance
To see your current credit balance:
GET /subscriptions/balancePricing: Free.
Additionally, every notification sent to your web-hook includes the remaining balance, so you can monitor it without making API calls.
Other Endpoints for Managing Flight Alert Subscriptions
| Endpoint | Description | Pricing |
|---|---|---|
GET /subscriptions/webhook | List all flight alert subscriptions associated with your account | Free |
GET /subscriptions/webhook/{id} | Get details of a flight alert subscription | Free |
DELETE /subscriptions/webhook/{id} | Removing a flight alert subscription | Free |
Other Considerations
Data Coverage: Before creating a flight alert subscription, ensure the flight or airport is within our live updates or ADS-B coverage. Subscribing to flights in areas with poor coverage will result in few or no alerts. Check coverage at aerodatabox.com/data-coverage or use the /health/services/airports/{icao}/feeds endpoint.
Airport Subscriptions: Use caution when subscribing to busy airports. A high-traffic airport can generate thousands of alerts and drain your credit balance quickly.
Transition Period
Until the 4th of April 2026 – Transition Period
Both billing systems operate in parallel.
- You are encouraged to create new flight alert using the new credit-based system.
- You may as well continue using the old lifetime-based system until the end of the transition period, but this is no longer recommended, as such subscriptions will halt after the end of the transition period.
| Aspect | Behavior |
|---|---|
| Create Subscription endpoint | Tier 4 by default. Add ?useCredits=true query string parameter to start using credit-based billing (endpoint call becomes free despite Tier 4).When using ?useCredits=true, specify maxDeliveryRetries parameter in the request body if you want to keep delivery retries functionality on. |
| Refresh Subscription endpoint | Tier 4 by default. Add ?useCredits=true to convert existing subscription to credit-based model (endpoint call becomes free despite Tier 4). |
| 7-day subscription expiration | Applies to all existing web-hook subscriptions and new web-hook subscriptions created without ?useCredits=true. |
| Check balance endpoint | Available now. Free to use. |
| Refill balance endpoint | Available now. Variable-rate. |
| Delivery Retries | Off by default for credit-based subscriptions (created with ?useCredits=true), unless otherwise specified by the user.2 retries otherwise (for lifetime-based subscriptions) |
After the 4th of April, 2026 – Transition Ends
- The life-time billing system is removed.
- The credit-based flight alert subscriptions become the only available option.
- All existing life-time based flight alert subscriptions that were not converted to credit-based billing by their owner are converted to credit-based system forcibly. If their owners do not have enough flight alert credit balance, alerts will halt until the balance is refilled.
| Component | Behavior |
|---|---|
| Create Subscription endpoint | Moved from Tier 4 to Free Tier. Always creates credit-based subscriptions from now on, with retries disabled by default. |
| Refresh Subscription endpoint | Removed. No longer needed since subscriptions don’t expire. |
| Tier 4 | Discontinued. |
| 7-day subscription expiration | No longer applies. All credit-based subscriptions are permanent. |
?useCredits=true parameter | No longer needed. You may continue including it, but it will be ignored. |
| Delivery Retries | Off by default, unless otherwise specified by the user. |
Migration Guide for the Existing Users
If you are already using Flight Alert API and have some active web-hook subscriptions you need to make several changes to your application to prevent service interruption.
Start creating all new web-hook subscriptions with the new parameters
Add ?useCredits=true query string parameter to start using credit-based billing for a new web-hook subscription. In that case, the call to this endpoint will be free despite being Tier 4.
You may keep using this parameter even after the transition period ends. It will be simply ignored by the system.
To keep delivery retry feature enabled for your flight alert subscription: when creating a credit-based web-hook subscription, specify maxDeliveryRetries parameter in the request body.
Refer to the “Technical Overview” section of this guide for more details.
Stop refreshing flight alert subscriptions
Under the new system flight alert subscriptions never expire. Remove any code that periodically calls the refresh endpoint.
Add credit balance management
Monitor your credit balance — either by calling GET /subscriptions/balance periodically, or by reading the remaining balance included in each notification sent to your web-hook.
Handle the case when balance close to or reaches zero. Remember that when the credit balance reaches zero, all flight alert subscriptions associated with your API account pause until the balance is refilled. To refill, use refill endpoint.
Refer to the “Technical Overview” section of this guide for more details.
Migrating Existing Flight Alert Subscriptions
Option A
- Let an existing flight alert subscription expire or explicitly delete it.
- Create a new flight alert subscription with the same subject (flight number or airport code) with
?useCredits=true - Maintain your flight alert subscription credit balance.
Option B
Refresh an existing subscription with ?useCredits=true to convert it:
PATCH /subscriptions/webhook/{subscriptionId}/refresh?useCredits=trueThis makes the call free (no Tier 4 charge) and converts the subscription to credit-based billing, removing its expiration.
You Need to Be on the Most Recent Pricing Plan
AeroDataBox API is provided through third-party marketplaces (RapidAPI and API.Market). Due to how these marketplaces operate, adding new endpoints requires creating the new versions of the pricing plans. That implies that any newly added endpoints are only available to users subscribing to the fresh versions of the pricing plans. Hence, to use the new credit-based flight alert system, you must be subscribed to the latest (non-deprecated) version of your pricing plan as well.
Therefore, if you’re an existing API user, you may need to re-subscribe to AeroDataBox API depending on when you subscribed or changed your pricing plan the last time:
- If you subscribed or changed your pricing plan before 2026 you need to re-subscribe.
- If you subscribed in January 2026, we suggest you to try calling the Check balance endpoint:
GET /subscriptions/balance. If it returns an error indicating the endpoint is unavailable, you need to re-subscribe.
To minimize the loss of unused API quota when re-subscribing you can:
- Wait until almost near end of your current billing cycle, or
- Use your remaining quota first;
and then unsubscribe from your current plan and subscribe to it again. Please note that if you last subscribed a long time ago, the pricing might have been changed since then.