Quick start guide

Welcome to the SE Ranking Data API! Whether you’re looking to integrate powerful SEO data into your applications, build custom dashboards, or automate your SEO workflows, you’ve come to the right place. This guide will walk you through the essential steps to get you up and running in minutes.

The Data API gives you programmatic access to the vast datasets that power the SE Ranking platform. You can tap into our comprehensive backlink index, domain intelligence, keyword research tools, and live SERP results to enhance your own tools and analysis.

Let’s dive in and make your first API call.

Step 1: Generate your API key

Before you can make any requests, you need to authenticate yourself. This is done using a unique API key.

1. Log in to your SE Ranking account.
2. Navigate to API in the sidebar.
3. Click on the API Dashboard section.
4. Select the Create API Key button. Give your key a descriptive name.
5. Once generated, copy the key and store it securely. You’ll need it for every API request.

Step 2: Authenticate your request

You have two methods to include your API key with each request. For this guide, we’ll focus on using the Authorization header, which is a common best practice.

• Authorization header (recommended): Include the key in the Authorization HTTP header, prefixed with Token.
  • Key: Authorization
  • Value: Token $YOUR_API_KEY$
• Query parameter: Alternatively, you can append your key to the request URL as a query parameter named apikey.
  • Example: ?apikey=$YOUR_API_KEY$

Step 3: Make your first API call

The best way to ensure everything is working correctly is to make a simple test call. We’ll query the /account/subscription endpoint to check your current API credit balance. This is a great way to perform a “smoke test” without consuming any number of credits.

All requests to the Data API use the following base URL: https://api.seranking.com

Let’s use curl in the command line to make the request. Replace YOUR_API_KEY with the key you generated in Step 1.

curl --location 'https://api.seranking.com/v1/account/subscription?output=json' \

--header 'Authorization: Token YOUR_API_KEY'

If the request is successful, you’ll receive a 200 OK response with a JSON object detailing your subscription status and remaining API units, like this:

{

    "subscription_info": {

        "status": "active",

        "start_date": "2025-09-26 14:20:02",

        "expiraton_date": "2025-10-26 14:20:02",

        "units_limit": 100000,

        "units_left": 100000

    }

}

Congratulations! You’ve successfully connected to the SE Ranking Data API.

Example use case: A complete keyword generation workflow

Now, let’s walk through a practical workflow an SEO professional would use to identify overlooked keyword opportunities for a domain.

Part 1: Analyze a domain’s global footprint

First, get a high-level view of your target’s performance. The domain/overview/worldwide endpoint aggregates organic and paid search statistics on a global scale.

Example call: Get worldwide organic and paid traffic metrics for visa.com.

curl --location 'https://api.seranking.com/v1/domain/overview/worldwide?domain=visa.com¤cy=USD' \

--header 'Authorization: Token YOUR_API_KEY'

This gives you a baseline understanding of the domain’s keyword count, estimated traffic, and traffic value across all regional databases.

Part 2: Identify top competitors

Next, discover who you’re up against in the SERPs. The domain/competitors endpoint provides a list of top organic or paid search rivals.

Example call: Find the top organic competitors for visa.com in the US database.

curl --location 'https://api.seranking.com/v1/domain/competitors?domain=visa.com&type=organic&source=us' \

--header 'Authorization: Token YOUR_API_KEY'

The response will list domains like mastercard.com, paypal.com, etc., along with the number of keywords you have in common.

Part 3: Uncover keyword opportunities

With your competitors identified, you can now pinpoint specific keyword opportunities.

A. Find your own dropped keywords (low-hanging fruit)

Use the domain/keywords endpoint with the pos_change parameter to find keywords where your domain’s ranking has slipped or been lost entirely. This is a clear signal to refresh your content.

Example call: Find keywords that visa.com has recently lost from the SERPs in the US.

curl --location 'https://api.seranking.com/v1/domain/keywords?source=us&domain=visa.com&type=organic&order_field=volume&order_type=desc' \

--header 'Authorization: Token YOUR_API_KEY'

B. Find competitor keyword gaps

Use the domain/keywords/comparison endpoint with diff=1 to find keywords a competitor ranks for that you do not. This is a goldmine for your content calendar.

Example call: Find keywords mastercard.com ranks for in the US, but visa.com does not.

curl --location 'https://api.seranking.com/v1/domain/keywords/comparison?source=us&domain=mastercard.com&compare=visa.com&type=organic&diff=1&order_type=desc&order_field=volume&cols=keyword%2Cvolume%2Ccpc%2Ccompetition%2Cdifficulty%2Cposition%2Cprice%2Ctraffic' \

--header 'Authorization: Token YOUR_API_KEY'

C. Expand your topic clusters

Once you have your core target keywords, use the keywords/similar and keywords/related endpoints to build out comprehensive topic clusters with long-tail variations and semantic questions.

Example call: Find keywords that are semantically similar to “best credit cards” to discover long-tail opportunities and build content depth.

curl --location 'https://api.seranking.com/v1/keywords/similar?source=us&keyword=best%20credit%20cards&limit=10' \

--header 'Authorization: Token YOUR_API_KEY'

D. Optimize for AI overviews

Finally, ensure your content is optimized for the future of search. Use our AIO Research endpoints to see where you and your competitors stand in Google’s AI Overviews. A powerful strategy is to find where your competitors are featured, but you are not.

Example call: Get a list of keywords where mastercard.com is featured in an AIO snippet. You can then parse the links array in the response for each keyword to see if visa.com is absent, revealing a content gap.

curl --location 'https://api.seranking.com/v1/domain/aio/keywords-by-target?target=mastercard.com&scope=domain&source=us&limit=10' \

--header 'Authorization: Token YOUR_API_KEY'

Understanding API credits and rate limits

• API credits: Every request consumes a certain number of API credits from your account balance. The cost varies by endpoint, and you can find a detailed breakdown of costs for all endpoints here. You can monitor your usage via the /account/subscription endpoint we used earlier.
• Rate limits: To ensure smooth performance for everyone, the API is limited to 10 requests per second. If you exceed this limit, you will receive a 429 Too Many Requests error. We recommend implementing an exponential backoff strategy for retries if you plan to make a high volume of calls.

What’s next?

This workflow is just one example of what’s possible. Dive into the full API documentation to explore all the available endpoints and start integrating powerful SEO data into your tools and processes today!

If you have any questions or run into any issues, please don’t hesitate to contact us at [email protected].