Autocomplete

Fast typeahead search for building search interfaces

The autocomplete endpoint provides fast typeahead search for building user interfaces. Queries return in ~200ms.

https://api.openalex.org/autocomplete/institutions?q=flori

See it in action at explore.openalex.org.

Request format

/autocomplete/<entity_type>?q=<query>

Parameter	Required	Description
entity_type	Optional	works, authors, sources, institutions, concepts, publishers, or funders
q	Yes	The search string

Response format

{
  "meta": {
    "count": 183,
    "db_response_time_ms": 5,
    "page": 1,
    "per_page": 10
  },
  "results": [
    {
      "id": "https://openalex.org/I33213144",
      "display_name": "University of Florida",
      "hint": "Gainesville, USA",
      "cited_by_count": 17190001,
      "entity_type": "institution",
      "external_id": "https://ror.org/02y3ad647"
    }
  ]
}

Result properties

Property	Description
id	OpenAlex ID
external_id	Canonical external ID (DOI, ORCID, ROR, etc.)
display_name	Entity name
entity_type	work, author, source, institution, concept, publisher, funder
cited_by_count	Citation count (for works) or sum of citations for linked works
works_count	Number of associated works (null for works)
hint	Additional context to help identify the result

The hint property

Hints help users distinguish between similar results:

Entity	Hint content
Work	Authors’ names (e.g., “R. Alexander Pyron, John J. Wiens”)
Author	Last known institution (e.g., “University of North Carolina, USA”)
Source	Host organization (e.g., “Oxford University Press”)
Institution	Location (e.g., “Gainesville, USA”)
Concept	Description (e.g., “the study of plant species and genera”)

ID lookups

Autocomplete detects IDs and matches them directly:

# Find author by ORCID
https://api.openalex.org/autocomplete?q=https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7436-3176

# Find source by OpenAlex ID
https://api.openalex.org/autocomplete/sources?q=S49861241

Filtering autocomplete

Combine with any filter or search:

# Works from 2010 about frogs, autocomplete on "greenhou"
https://api.openalex.org/autocomplete/works?filter=publication_year:2010&search=frogs&q=greenhou