4. Fair Usage Principles

All users — regardless of seniority, institutional affiliation, or urgency of need — are expected to adhere to the following principles when accessing AirQo data:

Principle	What It Means in Practice
Batch Your Downloads	Break multi-year data requests into quarterly or monthly chunks. Do not attempt to circumvent batch limits through workarounds.
Use the Right Tool	Use the Analytics Platform for exploratory and moderate-sized downloads. Use the API for automated, large-scale, or programmatic access.
Use Calibrated Data	Always download calibrated (not raw) data for research. This reduces the need for repeated re-downloads to apply corrections.
Download Once, Store Locally	Save your downloaded files. Do not re-download the same data multiple times. Maintain a local archive for your study period.
Apply Quality Control Locally	AirQo recommends a ≥50% data completeness threshold. Apply QC filters after downloading, not by requesting new downloads.
Plan Ahead	Account for download time in your research timeline. If your deadline is imminent, you should have planned data access earlier.
Respect Rate Limits	Do not write automated scripts that hammer the API without appropriate delays (back-off intervals) between requests.