diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 52ceb81..77af9fa 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -34,6 +34,7 @@ fuzzy-tester -t dev
 * `-o` Select an output mode. Valid values are `terminal` (default), `csv`, `json`, and `autocomplete` (see below)
 * `-q` Enable quiet mode. Only test failures (not successes) are printed
 * `-t` Select a test 'type' to filter on. This is a free-text value that can be added to each test, to allow running a subset of tests
+* `-r` Set a limit of the number of requests that can be sent per second when running tests. This is useful to avoid overloading a small Pelias server
 
 ## Test Case Files
 Test-cases are expected to live in `test_cases/`, and are split into test
diff --git a/bin/fuzzy-tester b/bin/fuzzy-tester
index 27cf380..619e7a9 100755
--- a/bin/fuzzy-tester
+++ b/bin/fuzzy-tester
@@ -27,7 +27,7 @@ var analyze_results = require( '../lib/analyze_results' );
   var urls = gather_test_urls(config, testSuites);
 
   // request all urls
-  request_urls(urls, function processResponses(responses) {
+  request_urls(config, urls, function processResponses(responses) {
     // responses is a simple object where the keys are urls, and the value is the
     // entire response from fetching that url
     // test cases can have many URLs (in autocomplete mode), and the same url
diff --git a/lib/processArguments.js b/lib/processArguments.js
index 258aec2..4dd5a06 100644
--- a/lib/processArguments.js
+++ b/lib/processArguments.js
@@ -47,6 +47,11 @@ function setUpCommander() {
     endpointHelp,
     'prod'
   )
+  .option(
+    '-r, --rate <int>',
+    'The maxium number of requests per second (RPS) to allow',
+    100
+  )
   .option(
     '-o, --output <type>',
     outputGeneratorHelp,
@@ -113,6 +118,7 @@ function getConfig() {
       url: apiUrl,
       name: commander.endpoint
     },
+    rate: commander.rate,
     outputGenerator: outputGenerator,
     testType: commander.testType,
     testSuites: testSuites,
diff --git a/lib/request_urls.js b/lib/request_urls.js
index 1df09ac..61a8fe3 100644
--- a/lib/request_urls.js
+++ b/lib/request_urls.js
@@ -25,12 +25,13 @@ function shouldRetryRequest(res) {
   return false;
 }
 
-function request_urls(urls, callback) {
+function request_urls(config, urls, callback) {
   var total_length = urls.length;
   var responses = {};
   var agent = new http.Agent({keepAlive: true, maxSockets: 1});
   var intervalId;
-  var test_interval = new ExponentialBackoff(1, 5, 1, 20000);
+  const interval = 1000 / config.rate; // the number of miliseconds to delay between requests
+  var test_interval = new ExponentialBackoff(interval, 5, interval, 20000);
   var delay = test_interval.getBackoff();
 
   var getOneUrl = function (){