Hey there, I totally get the frustration here—those since and until parameters not working on the /messages endpoint of the Conversation node is a well-known pain point, and it’s annoying that Facebook decided to drop support for this functionality back in 2017. Let’s break down some practical workarounds and best practices to handle this without slogging through every single historical message, while also avoiding rate limits.

Recommended Workarounds #

1. Use Webhooks for Real-Time Message Capture #

If your use case involves handling new incoming messages (rather than retroactively processing old history), this is the best approach by far. Set up a webhook subscription for the messages field of your Facebook app. Whenever a new message is sent in a conversation, Facebook will push it directly to your webhook endpoint.

• Pros: No need to poll the API repeatedly, avoids rate limit risks entirely, and you get messages instantly.
• Implementation Tip: Make sure your webhook endpoint is secure (use HTTPS) and properly validates Facebook’s request signatures to prevent spoofing.

2. Local Storage + Incremental Sync #

If you need to process historical messages or keep a local copy up to date, here’s a reliable flow:

1. Initial Full Sync: First, pull all messages from the conversation once (using cursor pagination) and store them in a local database, keeping track of each message’s created_time and id.
2. Incremental Updates: On subsequent syncs:
   • Fetch the latest created_time from your local database.
   • Start paginating through the /messages endpoint (remember, results are returned in reverse chronological order—newest first).
   • For each page, filter messages locally to only keep those with created_time later than your local latest timestamp.
   • Stop paginating as soon as you hit a message with a created_time older than your local latest (since all subsequent pages will only have older messages).

• This way, you don’t have to traverse the entire history every time—you only pull the new messages added since your last sync.

3. Filter by tags (If Applicable) #

If your messages have specific tags assigned (e.g., USER_GENERATED, BOT_RESPONSE, or custom tags), you can use the tags parameter to narrow down results:

curl -i -X GET "https://graph.facebook.com/v9.0/<conversation_id>/messages?fields=id,created_time,message&access_token=<access_token>&tags=USER_GENERATED"

• While this doesn’t solve the time-range filtering problem, it can drastically reduce the number of messages you need to process, making pagination faster and less likely to hit rate limits.

Best Practices to Avoid Rate Limits #

• Request Only Needed Fields: Always specify exactly which fields you need in the fields parameter (e.g., don’t request attachments if you don’t need them). Facebook’s rate limiting is based on request weight, not just the number of calls—smaller, targeted requests count less against your limit.
• Respect Retry Headers: If you get a 429 Too Many Requests error, check the Retry-After response header and wait that many seconds before retrying. Don’t spam the API with retries, as this can lead to temporary bans.
• Batch Requests Where Possible: Use Facebook’s Batch Request API to combine multiple related requests into one, which reduces the number of individual calls you make.
• Enterprise Rate Limit Increases: If you’re building a large-scale application, reach out to Facebook’s business support to request a rate limit increase—this is possible for verified enterprise apps.

It’s worth noting that Facebook’s official documentation now explicitly states that time-range filters (since/until) are not supported for the /messages endpoint, so don’t waste time testing alternative parameter combinations. The above methods are the go-to solutions used by most developers dealing with this limitation.

内容的提问来源于stack exchange，提问作者Max Vlaschuk-Gorelik