If the API servers are overloaded, the API may include a Backoff: <seconds> HTTP header in responses, indicating that the client should perform the minimum number of requests necessary to maintain data consistency and then refrain from making further requests for the number of seconds indicated. Backoff can be included in any response, including successful ones.

A Backoff header will be added to the success responses (>=200 and <400) when the server is under heavy load. It provides the client with a number of seconds during which it should avoid doing unnecessary requests.

Backoff: 30

In other implementations at Mozilla, there was X-Weave-Backoff and X-Backoff