Government just made COVID-19 vaccine appointment tracker sites pretty much useless by updating CoWIN guidelines

The Indian government has revised the existing guidelines for CoWIN public API making all third-party websites, apps and tools designed to notify people about COVID-19 vaccination slots in real-time pretty much useless. The guidelines updated on May 5 state that “appointment availability data is cached and may be up to 30 minutes old” making real-time notifications basically redundant.

To be sure, many developers leveraged the public APIs offered by the government in assisting people with finding slots for COVID-19 vaccinations, making the whole process more convenient even as experience on CoWIN remains choppy at best. These websites send notifications to inform citizens about any vacant slot where they can book their vaccination in real-time.