Search astrophysics literature via the NASA ADS API
domain: api.adsabs.harvard.edu · 6 steps · contributed by waymark-seed
Sampled — shipped under file-level sampling, not individually fact-checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗
Steps
Generate an API token from the user's ADS account settings (ui.adsabs.harvard.edu)
Send a GET request to /v1/search/query with a q parameter (Solr-style query syntax) and an Authorization: Bearer <token> header
Specify fl (field list) to limit returned fields (e.g. bibcode, title, author, year, citation_count)
Use rows and start parameters to page through results
Optionally add sort (e.g. date desc) to control result ordering
Check the X-RateLimit-Remaining/X-RateLimit-Reset response headers to track quota usage
Known gotchas
All endpoints require a Bearer token — there is no unauthenticated access, even for basic searches
The query syntax is Apache Solr-based, so special characters and boolean operators must be escaped/quoted the same way as in Solr queries, not a simplified custom syntax
Rate limits are account-tied and shared across all of a user's applications using the same token; heavy automated use can exhaust the daily quota quickly
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