[jerf]

Strongly agree. I have an API I work on where if you ask for a couple of gigabytes of data, it'll send it to you, because if you're asking for it, that's what you want. It gets streamed out, and the docs warn you that you will get exactly what you asked for, so you may want to chunk up on your side (for this particular API there is a trivial way for clients to do that), or if you can handle a full stream, go nuts.

Pagination would just complicate things. I think with most APIs, intended as APIs (i.e., not just an endpoint primarily meant to feed a front-end page), you're better off thinking of your default as "I'm going to just stream everything they ask for", and look for reasons why that won't work, rather than start from the presumption that everything must be paginated from the beginning.

Don't get me wrong; there are plenty of solid reasons to paginate. You may discover one applies to your API. But if you can leave it out, it's often simpler for both the producer and the consumer. Wait until you find the need for it. Plus, if that happens, you'll have a better understanding of the actual problem you need to solve and better solutions may reveal themselves.