1Forge Pricing: Real-time Forex Data API Costs (2026)

Pricing overview

1Forge offers a tiered pricing structure for its real-time and historical forex data API, designed to accommodate various usage requirements from individual developers to enterprise applications. The core pricing model is subscription-based, primarily differing by the number of API requests allowed per month and the specific features included, such as access to historical data, tick data, and refresh rates. Users can select a plan that aligns with their anticipated data consumption and the level of data granularity needed for their financial applications or currency conversion tools.

All paid plans include access to real-time forex data for over 100 currency pairs, delivered via a REST API. Higher-tier subscriptions unlock enhanced features like faster refresh rates (down to 1-second intervals), extensive historical data, and access to the WebSocket API for push notifications of rate changes. A free tier is available for initial testing and low-volume applications, limited by daily request count.

The pricing strategy aims to provide scalability, allowing users to upgrade or downgrade their plans as their needs evolve. Detailed pricing information for each tier is published on the official 1Forge pricing page. Understanding the distinction between REST API calls and WebSocket connections, and how they contribute to request limits, is crucial for optimizing usage and cost.

Plans and tiers

1Forge provides several subscription tiers, each structured around a monthly request allowance and a specific feature set. The plans are designed to scale with usage, offering more requests and advanced capabilities at higher price points.

Plan comparison

Each plan includes access to the core real-time forex data API. The differentiation largely comes from the refresh rate, the depth of historical data, and advanced features like tick data and WebSocket support. The 1Forge API documentation provides further details on each feature's availability per plan.

Free tier and limits

1Forge offers a free tier that provides 100 API requests per day. This tier is suitable for developers who want to evaluate the API's capabilities, build small personal projects, or integrate currency conversion into applications with very low usage requirements. The free tier includes access to real-time forex rates for over 100 currency pairs, refreshing at a maximum interval of 60 seconds.

Key limitations of the free tier include:

• Request Volume: Limited to 100 calls per 24-hour period.
• Refresh Rate: Real-time data updates are capped at 60-second intervals.
• Feature Access: Does not include historical data, tick data, or the WebSocket API.
• Support: Basic community support, with no dedicated technical assistance.

For applications requiring higher request volumes, faster refresh rates, or access to historical and tick data, upgrading to a paid plan is necessary. The free tier serves as an entry point for testing and non-commercial use cases, as detailed on the 1Forge pricing page.

Real-world cost examples

To illustrate the practical implications of 1Forge's pricing, consider the following scenarios:

• Scenario A: Personal Currency Converter App

  A developer builds a personal currency converter app that makes an average of 50 requests per day for real-time rates. This usage falls comfortably within the Free tier's 100 requests/day limit. The cost would be $0 per month, provided the refresh rate of 60 seconds is acceptable for the application.

• Scenario B: Small Business Financial Dashboard

  A small business uses 1Forge to power a financial dashboard that updates 10 currency pairs every 10 minutes during an 8-hour workday. This translates to (10 pairs * 6 updates/hour * 8 hours/day) = 480 requests per day. Over a 30-day month, this is approximately 14,400 requests. This usage would fit within the Basic plan's 250,000 monthly requests, costing $10 per month. This plan also provides 10-second refresh rates and 1 year of historical data, which could be beneficial for trend analysis.

• Scenario C: Online Trading Platform Data Feed

  An online trading platform requires real-time updates for 50 currency pairs every 5 seconds, 24/7. This would involve (50 pairs * 12 updates/minute * 60 minutes/hour * 24 hours/day) = 864,000 requests per day, or approximately 25,920,000 requests per month. This volume exceeds the Professional plan. The Business plan, offering 15,000,000 requests per month and WebSocket API access, would be the most suitable option, costing $99 per month. However, the platform would need to manage its request frequency or consider an Enterprise plan if its actual usage consistently exceeds 15 million requests.

• Scenario D: Historical Data Analysis Tool

  A data analyst needs to regularly pull historical forex data for backtesting trading strategies. They might make large batches of requests once a week, totaling 50,000 requests per month. They also need historical data extending back several years. The Standard plan at $25 per month would provide 1,000,000 requests and 5 years of historical data, easily accommodating their needs.

These examples highlight how the choice of plan is directly tied to the application's request volume, required data refresh rate, and the necessity for features like historical or tick-level data. The 1Forge API documentation can help estimate request counts for specific use cases.

How the pricing compares

When evaluating 1Forge's pricing, it is useful to compare it against other providers of forex data APIs. Alternatives like Open Exchange Rates, ExchangeRate-API, and Fixer offer varying pricing models, often with different free tier limits, request allowances, and feature sets.

• Open Exchange Rates: This service typically offers a free plan with 1,000 requests per month and hourly updates. Its paid plans start at a similar price point to 1Forge's Basic plan, but often with lower monthly request limits for comparable prices. For example, Open Exchange Rates' developer plan offers 10,000 requests/month at a similar price to 1Forge's 250,000 requests/month Basic plan, making 1Forge more cost-effective for higher volumes at the entry paid tier. More information on their offerings can be found on the Open Exchange Rates plans page.
• ExchangeRate-API: This API provides a free tier with 1,500 requests per month, with updates every 24-36 hours. Its paid plans are generally competitive, often focusing on simplicity and ease of integration. While it may offer more free requests than 1Forge's daily limit, 1Forge's paid tiers provide significantly higher request volumes and faster refresh rates at competitive price points, particularly for real-time applications. Details are available on the ExchangeRate-API pricing page.
• Fixer: Fixer often provides a free tier of 1,000 requests per month with hourly updates. Its pricing for paid plans can be higher than 1Forge for comparable request volumes, especially when considering real-time or frequent updates. Fixer's strength lies in its extensive currency coverage and historical data, but for pure volume and refresh rate at lower price points, 1Forge can offer a more economical solution. For specific plan details, refer to the Fixer pricing page.

Overall, 1Forge positions itself as a competitive option, particularly for applications requiring high volumes of real-time data and fast refresh rates at cost-effective monthly rates. Its generous request allowances in paid tiers, starting from the Basic plan, can offer a better value proposition for developers and businesses with moderate to high data consumption compared to some alternatives. Developers should evaluate the specific features, refresh rates, and request limits required for their projects against the pricing of each provider to determine the most suitable option.