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Gutendex

JSON search over the Project Gutenberg library

📖 Books & WordsDYINGchecked 39 min ago
AUTH NONECORS ✓AGENT ✓HTTPS ✓COMMERCIAL ?

A read-only web API over Project Gutenberg's public-domain book catalog. Search by author, title, language or topic and get back IDs, authors, download counts and file links. No key required.

25HOW IT'S SCORED ⓘ
▶ Run liveDocs ↗
Status badge · for your READMEshipapis health badge: 25 · dying
Uptime history
8.8%90 days
8.3%30 days
3229P50 · ms
4690P95 · ms
operationalpartialdownno data
Response time · last 48 checks
Fastest 1169 ms, slowest 4690 ms, most recent 3229 ms.
Live response samplecaptured by our last successful check
GET https://gutendex.com/books/?search=dickens

{
  "count": 230,
  "results": [
    {
      "id": 564,
      "title": "The Mystery of Edwin Drood",
      "authors": [
        {
          "name": "Dickens, Charles",
          "birth_year": 1812,
          "death_year": 1870
        }
      ],
      "download_count": 39676
    }
  ]
}
Call itcurl · fetch · python
curl "https://gutendex.com/books/?search=dickens"
const res = await fetch("https://gutendex.com/books/?search=dickens");
const data = await res.json();
console.log(data);
import requests

res = requests.get("https://gutendex.com/books/?search=dickens")
print(res.json())
Endpoints · 3DyingFULL DOCS ↗
Dying — error rate climbing on GET /books/?search=dickens3229 mschecked 39 min ago
GET/books/?search=dickensPROBED

JSON search over the Project Gutenberg library

GET/books/?limit=5

Books — documented GET route.

GET/books/?page=1

Books — documented GET route.

Machine-readable spec

We probe a documented GET and expect 2xx JSON — full uptime and health score. Export includes every documented route below.

Response-shape history

Stable. No schema drift observed since monitoring began — the response shape has not changed under our checks.

Gutendex: common questions

Is Gutendex free to use?

Yes — Gutendex is a free books & words API. Free tier: Free, no key. Whether the free tier allows commercial use is unclear — check the provider docs.

Does Gutendex need an API key?

No — Gutendex needs no API key or signup. You can call it straight away; rate limits still apply (Unpublished).

Can I call Gutendex from the browser?

Yes — Gutendex returns CORS headers over HTTPS, so front-end code can fetch it directly with no backend proxy. Use the fetch snippet on this page, or hit "Run live" to try it now.

Is Gutendex up right now?

As of our last scheduled check, Gutendex is dying with 8.8% uptime over 90 days and a 3229 ms median response. We re-probe it every sweep — the status badge and uptime chart above always show the latest.