Emergency Profile
One-click fleet-wide rate limit override for incidents and traffic spikes.
What it is
The Emergency Profile (EP) is a pre-configured set of tighter rate limit policies that can be activated instantly across your entire fleet — no redeploy, no config change.
It's designed for two scenarios:
- Traffic spike — you're getting hammered and need to shed load immediately
- Incident response — a downstream service is struggling and you need to reduce pressure fast
Activating
From the dashboard, click Activate Emergency Profile on any service. All running instances pick it up on their next poll (within 30 seconds by default).
You can also activate via the CLI:
ratelane emergency on
ratelane emergency offHow it overrides
When the EP is active, it takes highest priority — above all per-route policies and global defaults. Your normal policies are preserved and resume automatically when the EP is deactivated.
Configuration
Set your EP limits in Dashboard → Settings → Emergency Profile. You can configure different limits per route or apply a single global multiplier (e.g. reduce all limits to 20% of normal).