Why do free APIs die?

The typical arc: a startup launches with a generous free tier to build developer mindshare, raises venture capital, then either monetises the API to justify the infrastructure cost or gets acquired (and the acquirer shuts down the external API). Dark Sky is the canonical acquisition kill — Apple bought it in 2020 and shut the API in 2023. Twitter's decision was purely financial: at ~$250,000/month in API infrastructure costs with minimal direct revenue, the free tier became indefensible after the Musk acquisition.

How do I prevent my product from depending on a dying API?

Three practices reduce the blast radius: (1) wrap every third-party API behind an internal adapter layer so you can swap providers without touching business logic; (2) monitor the API's status page and changelog — companies usually announce deprecations 90 days out; (3) prefer APIs backed by open data (government sources, OSM, ECB) over commercial providers whose free tier is a growth tactic. Open-Meteo, Frankfurter, and the Hacker News API have no incentive to go paid because they're funded by the communities they serve.

Where can I see the current state of free APIs?

FreeAPI.watch monitors 77 free APIs with hourly checks. The /graveyard page lists APIs that have gone paid or been discontinued. The changelog at /changelog shows recent status changes. For real-time status, each API detail page shows the latest check result and 30-day uptime history.

The 2026 Free API Graveyard: 6 APIs That Died and What to Use Instead

April 1, 2026 · analysis

Twitter, Reddit (official), Dark Sky, Yahoo Finance, MetaWeather, and Weather Underground all killed free access. Here's the timeline and the replacements that actually work.

Six APIs that hundreds of thousands of developers once relied on are either dead or behind a paywall. This article covers the exact timeline of each, what killed them, and the working free replacements you can use today.

The pattern is consistent enough that I now treat any free tier from a VC-backed company as a temporary subsidy, not a durable contract. The APIs backed by government data or open-source communities are the ones worth building on.

1. Twitter API v1.1 Free Tier — Killed February 2023

Twitter's free API tier was revoked on February 9, 2023, with roughly 48 hours of notice. The decision was framed as an anti-bot measure but the economics were straightforward: Twitter (by then X Corp) was running at a massive loss and the API had become infrastructure for competitors like third-party clients (Apollo, Tweetbot, Twitterrific) and academic researchers.

The official v2 Basic plan now costs $100/month for 10,000 tweets/month read access — effectively ruling out most indie projects. The free tier allows posting only, with no read access.

Replacement: For social conversation data, the best free option is the Reddit JSON API (60 req/min, no key, just set a User-Agent) or the Hacker News API (unlimited, no key). Neither covers Twitter-specific content, but for most use cases — trending topics, tech discussion, developer sentiment — they work. See /reddit-json and /hacker-news for live status.

2. Dark Sky API — Killed March 31, 2023

Dark Sky was acquired by Apple in March 2020 with an explicit announcement that the API would be shut down. The deadline moved from 2021 to 2023, but the outcome was predetermined from day one: Apple wanted the hyperlocal precipitation model for the iOS Weather app, not the API business.

Dark Sky's hyperlocal 'minute-by-minute' rain forecasts were genuinely unique. No free API today replicates its sub-kilometre precipitation nowcasting.

Replacement: Open-Meteo (10,000 calls/day, no key) covers global forecasts at 1-hour resolution using multiple NOAA and ECMWF models. For Germany specifically, Bright Sky (DWD data, no key, unlimited) is exceptional. For the US, the NOAA National Weather Service API is official government data with no key and no rate limit. See /open-meteo, /bright-sky, and /noaa-weather.

3. Yahoo Finance API — Killed 2017 (scrape era ended ~2022)

Yahoo Finance never had an official public API — it was always an undocumented internal endpoint that developers reverse-engineered. The original endpoint died in 2017. Various unofficial wrappers kept working via scraping until Yahoo began actively blocking them around 2022.

If you were using a Python library like yfinance, it still works through aggressive header spoofing — but it's fragile, against Yahoo's Terms of Service, and subject to breaking at any time.

Replacement: For stock market data, Alpha Vantage (25 calls/day free, key required) covers US equities with 20+ years of history. Twelve Data (800 calls/day, key required) is more generous. For pure currency/forex, Frankfurter (unlimited, no key, ECB data) is the cleanest free option. See /alpha-vantage, /twelve-data, /frankfurter.

4. MetaWeather API — Killed June 2022

MetaWeather was a clean, no-key weather API widely used in tutorials because it required zero setup. It went offline in June 2022 with no advance notice and no official announcement. The domain now returns a 404.

It was popular precisely because it was so easy — a single GET request to `api.metaweather.com/api/location/search/?query=london` returned usable data. That simplicity made it a tutorial staple, which is why thousands of beginner Python and JavaScript projects broke overnight.

Replacement: Open-Meteo is the direct replacement for tutorial use cases. It's also key-free, returns clean JSON, and has 10,000 calls/day on the free tier. The endpoint pattern is similarly simple: `https://api.open-meteo.com/v1/forecast?latitude=51.5&longitude=-0.12¤t=temperature_2m`. See /open-meteo for live status.

5. Weather Underground Personal Weather Station API — Paywall 2018

Weather Underground went from free to paid in May 2018 after being acquired by The Weather Company (IBM). The PWS (Personal Weather Station) data API, which let you pull hyperlocal observations from a network of home weather stations, moved behind a $0–$200+/month paywall.

This was a significant loss for hyperlocal weather enthusiasts. The PWS network had 250,000+ stations and provided street-level granularity that no other source matched.

Replacement: There is no free equivalent for PWS network data. For standard forecasts, the options above apply. If you need hyperlocal precipitation, Tomorrow.io offers 25 locations free on their API tier — a significant step down but the closest available.

6. Reddit Official API — Went Paid June 2023

Reddit's official API went paid in June 2023, triggering the 'Reddit blackout' protest where thousands of subreddits went dark. The pricing — $0.24/1,000 API calls — was specifically designed to kill third-party apps like Apollo, which was processing 7 billion API calls per month (a $1.7M/month bill at that rate).

The official OAuth API is now effectively paid for any app with significant read volume. Apollo, Relay, RIF, and most third-party Reddit clients shut down within weeks.

Replacement: The Reddit JSON API still works without a key for read access. By appending `.json` to any Reddit URL, you get structured data at 60 req/min. This is technically against Reddit's updated ToS for commercial use, but for personal projects and research it remains functional. See /reddit-json for current status. Note: this is an unofficial endpoint that could break; don't build a production app on it.

The Pattern: What These Six Have in Common

Every API on this list shared one characteristic: the free tier existed to build a developer ecosystem, not because the data was cheap to serve. When the business model changed — acquisition, pivoting to enterprise, going public — the free tier became the first casualty.

The surviving free APIs (Open-Meteo, Frankfurter, Hacker News, NOAA, Nominatim) are either funded by public institutions, operated by open-source communities, or structured as genuine freemium products where the free tier genuinely serves the company's interests.

Before building on any free API, I now check two things: who funds the free tier, and what happens to the project if the free tier disappears. If the answer to the first question is 'VC money' and the answer to the second is 'catastrophic', use an adapter layer and have a paid fallback ready.