Wikidata

About Wikidata

Wikidata's MediaWiki API is the programmatic interface for querying and editing Wikidata, exposed through the standard MediaWiki Action API. Requests are made via GET or POST, with GET preferred for routing to replica servers and caching; input must be NFC-normalized UTF-8, and multi-value parameters are pipe-separated. Responses and errors follow MediaWiki conventions, including an "MediaWiki-API-Error" HTTP header for erroneous requests.

The API supports a large set of actions covering both content and administrative operations, including page creation and editing, deletion, content model changes, account creation and authentication, user blocking, AbuseFilter checks, notifications (Echo), Structured Discussions (Flow), mass messaging, and translation tagging. Default limits allow up to 50 inputs per multivalue parameter and 500 results per query (50 for slow queries), rising to 500 inputs and 5,000 results (500 for slow queries) for users with the apihighlimits right, such as bots, administrators, and Wikidata staff.

This is intended for developers building bots, tools, or integrations that read or write Wikidata (and other MediaWiki-based wikis) programmatically. A Special:ApiSandbox is provided for testing requests, and an API Announcements mailing list is available for notice of breaking changes.

Key features

• Programmatic access to Wikidata's structured data via the MediaWiki Action API
• Supports GET and POST request methods for API calls
• Handles multivalue parameters and templated parameters for flexible queries
• Higher rate limits (500 inputs, 5,000 results) for users with apihighlimits right
• Provides a Special:ApiSandbox tool for testing API requests

Frequently asked questions