Buffer
Turn orders and customer changes into the right Buffer audiences and campaigns, with a person approving what goes out.
8 ways to read, 2 ways to write, each write switched on by you.
Quality checks
Built and tested with example responses.
- Ready to connect: doneEvery listed action is built in.
- Built and tested with example responses: doneEach action is built from the provider’s published API and tested against example responses, errors, rate limits and paging.
Connected, approved, proven.
The things teams do most with Buffer, an example flow with a person in the loop, and what Nexra keeps as proof.
Top actions
- Create idea
ideas.createApproval by rule - Create draft post
post_drafts.createApproval by rule - List channels
channels.listRead
Example flow
- Buffer · List channels
channels.listDone - Buffer · Create idea
ideas.createMaker-checker - Nexra · Record the decision and result in the evidence chainProven
Example workflow. Routine runs go through on their own. Only a change your rules flag, such as one over a limit you set, waits for the right person, who sees the exact change and the rule before it reaches Buffer.
What gets logged
- Whether it ran on its own or who approved it, and under which rule
- A fingerprint of the exact request sent to Buffer
- Buffer's reply: what it created or changed
- One entry in the evidence chain, linked to the one before
Try this in the sandbox
Run the whole flow with test data in your sandbox, then connect your own account when you are ready to go live.
For developers
Technical detail
Read Buffer organisations, channels, posts, ideas and tags, and create draft posts and ideas. Nothing is queued, scheduled or published by Nexra.
Buffer API docs- Source actions
- 8
- Destination actions
- 2
- Data types
- 7
What you can map
Reads are always available. Writes are off until you switch them on for a connection, and governed writes follow your policies.
account1
- Get accountSource
Get the API key owner's account ID, name and timezone.
channels2
- Get channelSource
Get one channel's network, handle, timezone and connection state.
- List channelsSource
List an organisation's connected social channels (profiles and pages).
ideas2
- Create ideaDestinationNot retried automaticallyApproval before production
Create an idea in an organisation's Create space. Ideas are not attached to a channel and are never published.
- List ideasSource
List an organisation's ideas (content not yet assigned to a channel).
organizations1
- List organisationsSource
List the organisations the API key's account belongs to.
post drafts1
- Create draft postDestinationNot retried automaticallyApproval before production
Create a draft post for a channel. Drafts are never published until a person schedules them in Buffer.
posts2
- Get postSource
Get one post's text, status, schedule, assets and publishing result.
- List postsSourceIncremental
List an organisation's posts by status, channel, tag, creation date or scheduled date. Includes drafts, scheduled and sent posts.
tags1
- List tagsSource
List an organisation's tags, sorted by name.
Access and limits
- Authentication
- Buffer personal API key (Bearer)
- Plans and access
- All Buffer plans, including Free, can create personal API keys (1 on Free, 3 on Essentials, 5 on Team). The GraphQL API is in public beta. A personal API key acts as your Buffer account only and sees the organisations and channels you can access. Third-party OAuth apps are not used here.
- Test environment
- There is no sandbox. Draft posts and ideas are safe to create because they are never published until scheduled in Buffer.
- Rate limits
- Per API key: 100 requests per 15 minutes, 250 (Team 500) per 24 hours and 3,000 to 15,000 per 30 days by plan. HTTP 429 carries Retry-After; Nexra honours it on reads within its wait limit. Query cost, depth (25) and alias (30) limits also apply.
- Pagination
- Posts, ideas and tags use Relay cursors: first and after = pageInfo.endCursor while hasNextPage. Organisations and channels are single lists.
- Provider events
- Buffer does not document webhooks for the GraphQL API. Flows run on demand, on a schedule, or when a scheduled check finds new or changed records.
Before you build a flow
- No publishing: Create draft post always sends saveToDraft: true. Buffer documents that a draft has status draft and is not published until someone explicitly schedules it. Scheduled, queued (addToQueue, shareNext, customScheduled) and share-now posts are never created, and posts are never edited, moved in the queue or deleted.
- How Buffer publishes, for reference: a scheduled post is sent automatically at its dueAt time (schedulingType automatic) or as a reminder for a person to publish (notification), unless the channel queue is paused. Nexra only reads these posts.
- Create draft post uses mode addToQueue only because Buffer requires a mode; with saveToDraft the post is not placed in the queue. Approval-required channels may return the draft as needs_approval.
- Drafts accept text, tag IDs and public HTTPS image URLs with alt text. Video, document, link-card, thread and network-specific metadata are not exposed. Binary upload is an engine gap; Buffer fetches media from your URL.
- Create draft post and Create idea have no idempotency key; they are not retried automatically, so a timed-out request may have created the record.
- Post author identity (email, name, avatar) and account email are never mapped.
- Buffer has no updated-since filter for posts; Nexra filters by createdAt (createdAfter/createdBefore) and dueAt.
- The GraphQL API is in public beta; tag queries are marked experimental by Buffer.
Developer reference
- Create the Buffer credentials described above with the narrowest permissions your flows need.
- In Nexra, open Connect, then Connections, then New connection, choose Buffer, enter its settings and credentials, and tick only the write actions you need. Connection guide
- Test the connection, then use its actions as flow sources and destinations. Flow guide
Machine-readable detail: GET /api/public/connect/connectors/buffer and the Connections API.