Project how long a follower target takes: POST /tools/growth-simulator

What this endpoint answers

Runs the growth model behind the website's simulator: a daily gain derived from content quality, niche weighting, posting cadence and an audience-size scaling ladder, compounded until the target is hit. Returns the time to target, the milestones passed on the way, and the model inputs so the projection can be audited.

This is a catalog read: it is served from the CRM Solid database in milliseconds, costs one budget unit, and reports how old the reading is in meta.cache_age_s. It needs the tools:use scope (Tools): Run the analysis tools: valuation, follower audit, scoring, and more.

Good to know

Free: this endpoint reaches no upstream and spends no credit. It is metered as a normal call, not a live one.
The website's version multiplies each simulated day by a random 0.8-1.2 jitter. The API runs the same model at the jitter's expected value so identical input always returns an identical answer.
The model stops after 30 simulated years. An unreachable target returns projection.reached_target = false with null durations rather than a fabricated number.
This is a planning heuristic, not a forecast of any specific account.

Parameters

This endpoint takes no path or query parameters.

Request body

current_followersintegerrequired
Follower count today. 0 to 100000000.
target_followersintegerrequired
Follower goal. Must be greater than current_followers.
nichestringoptional
Topic weighting applied to daily growth.
qualitystringoptional
Content quality tier. Sets the baseline daily gain and the minutes spent per post.
posts_per_dayintegeroptional
Posting cadence, 1 to 100. Applied as a log2 bonus, so doubling output is worth less each time.

Example request body

{
  "current_followers": 1200,
  "target_followers": 100000,
  "niche": "crypto",
  "quality": "professional",
  "posts_per_day": 5
}

Call it

Authenticate with a bearer token or the x-api-key header. Keys are server-to-server credentials. Never embed one in front-end code - call the API from your own backend and forward the result.

curl

curl -X POST "https://crmsolid.com/data-api/v2/tools/growth-simulator" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer psk_live_..." \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"current_followers":1200,"target_followers":100000,"niche":"crypto","quality":"professional","posts_per_day":5}'

JavaScript

const res = await fetch("https://crmsolid.com/data-api/v2/tools/growth-simulator", {
  method: "POST",
  headers: {
    Authorization: `Bearer ${process.env.CRM_SOLID_DATA_API_KEY}`,
    "Content-Type": "application/json",
  },
  body: JSON.stringify({
    "current_followers": 1200,
    "target_followers": 100000,
    "niche": "crypto",
    "quality": "professional",
    "posts_per_day": 5
  }),
});

if (!res.ok) {
  const { error } = await res.json();
  throw new Error(`${error.code}: ${error.message} (${error.request_id})`);
}

const { data, meta } = await res.json();

Python

import json
import os

import requests

body = json.loads("""
{
  "current_followers": 1200,
  "target_followers": 100000,
  "niche": "crypto",
  "quality": "professional",
  "posts_per_day": 5
}
""")

res = requests.post(
    "https://crmsolid.com/data-api/v2/tools/growth-simulator",
    headers={"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['CRM_SOLID_DATA_API_KEY']}"},
    json=body,
    timeout=30,
)
res.raise_for_status()

payload = res.json()
data, meta = payload["data"], payload["meta"]

Keys look like psk_live_... for production keys, psk_test_... for test keys and are minted in the panel.

What comes back

Success is { data, meta }. Failure is { error: { code, message, request_id } }. The body below is the spec's own example: the values in it are illustrative readings, not live numbers.

Input current followers: 1,200
Input target followers: 100,000
Input niche: crypto
Input quality: professional
Input posts per day: 5
Projection total days: 892
Projection years: 2
Projection months: 5
Projection total posts: 4,460
Projection total hours: 2,230
Projection reached target: yes
Daily followers gained at start: 6.53
Milestones: 6 items
Model niche multiplier: 1.4
Model quality base followers per day: 25
Model posting bonus: 1.697
Model deterministic: yes

200 POST /tools/growth-simulator

{
  "data": {
    "input": {
      "current_followers": 1200,
      "target_followers": 100000,
      "niche": "crypto",
      "quality": "professional",
      "posts_per_day": 5
    },
    "projection": {
      "total_days": 892,
      "years": 2,
      "months": 5,
      "total_posts": 4460,
      "total_hours": 2230,
      "reached_target": true
    },
    "daily_followers_gained_at_start": 6.53,
    "milestones": [
      {
        "followers": 2500,
        "days_from_start": 199
      },
      {
        "followers": 5000,
        "days_from_start": 359
      },
      {
        "followers": 10000,
        "days_from_start": 559
      },
      {
        "followers": 25000,
        "days_from_start": 700
      },
      {
        "followers": 50000,
        "days_from_start": 795
      },
      {
        "followers": 100000,
        "days_from_start": 892
      }
    ],
    "model": {
      "niche_multiplier": 1.4,
      "quality_base_followers_per_day": 25,
      "posting_bonus": 1.697,
      "deterministic": true
    }
  },
  "meta": {
    "request_id": "req_9f2c41a8b3d5",
    "generated_at": "2026-08-23T09:14:02.317Z",
    "took_ms": 42
  }
}

The meta block

request_idstringrequired
Unique id for this request. Quote it in a support ticket.
generated_atstringrequired
Server time the response was produced.
took_msintegerrequired
Milliseconds spent server-side.
pagePageoptional
sourcestringoptional
Which backend served the payload, for endpoints with more than one.
cache_age_sintegeroptional
Age of the underlying data in seconds. 0 for live reads.

When it fails

POST /tools/growth-simulator documents 7 failure statuses. Branch on error.code, which is stable and enumerated; message is prose and may change.

401Unauthorizedunauthorized | invalid_key
No key was presented, or the key is unknown, revoked or expired.
402PaymentRequiredpayment_required | subscription_inactive
The key is valid but the plan behind it cannot serve the call: the included requests are spent and overage is switched off, capped or unfunded (payment_required), or the billing period lapsed and was not renewed (subscription_inactive). Retrying does not help; paying does. The X-Plan-* headers on this response say how far past the line you are.
Carries X-Plan, X-Plan-Limit, X-Plan-Overage, X-Plan-Period-End, X-Plan-Remaining.
403Forbiddenforbidden_scope | forbidden_ip
The key is valid but not allowed to make this call: it lacks the scope, or the request came from an address outside the key's allowlist.
422InvalidRequestinvalid_request
A parameter is malformed, out of range or mutually exclusive with another. `details` names the offending fields.
429RateLimitedrate_limited | quota_exceeded
Either the burst ceiling for the current minute or the daily quota is spent. Distinguish with the code: rate_limited clears within the minute, quota_exceeded does not clear until 00:00 UTC.
Carries Retry-After, X-Quota-Limit, X-Quota-Remaining, X-RateLimit-Limit, X-RateLimit-Remaining, X-RateLimit-Reset, X-Request-Id.
500InternalErrorinternal_error
Something failed on our side. Internals are never leaked; quote the request id.
503Unavailableupstream_timeout | upstream_error | not_configured
The request could not be served right now. BRANCH ON error.code, not on the status: 'upstream_timeout' means a source was too slow (this is what a catalog query hitting its 15-second statement timeout returns, so it is reachable from any endpoint that reads the corpus, not only the live-scrape ones) and the same call is worth retrying with backoff - narrowing it with a smaller limit, a filtered scope or a less popular account makes it far less likely; 'upstream_error' means a source was unreachable, so back off further; 'not_configured' means the capability has no backing service in this deployment, and retrying will never help.

Every response carries X-Request-Id and meta.request_id. Quote it in support requests.

Coverage and limits

This endpoint is not platform-specific. Rate limits come from the tier on your key.

Tier	Requests a minute	Requests a day	Live reads a minute
free	30	1,000	5
standard	120	25,000	20
pro	600	250,000	60
unlimited	6,000	10,000,000	600

This call only draws on the ordinary per-minute and per-day columns. Every response reports where you stand in X-RateLimit-Limit, X-RateLimit-Remaining, X-RateLimit-Reset and the X-Plan headers.

The rest of the Tools group

The analysis tools behind the public free-tool pages, callable directly: valuation, follower audit, scoring and the rest. Metered like a live call, because each run costs compute or an upstream fetch.

Other groups

Accounts Directory X People Live scrape Insights Trends Identity Graph Watch Research Leads

Start calling it

A key takes a minute to mint in the panel, no card. The reference covers authentication, the envelope, scopes, rate limits and every error code in one page.

Get a key All 127 endpoints Full reference What the Data API is

Reference path: /data-api/reference/tools-growth-simulator