Search API

The Search API lets you search for one or more titles (products) in a digital library or school collection.

Use the query parameters detailed below to determine the number of products to display, define your search terms, and limit or sort the results.

Results are returned as a paginated JSON response.

What you can do with the Search API

• Search for a specific title, author, or series in a digital collection.
• Use parameters and sort options to return lists of titles.
• See the titles included in a curated list.

Using the Search API

The Search API uses a products link instead of a search link. You can find the products link by accessing the Library Account API. The response will include a collectionToken, which determines what titles the product link returns. The collectionToken will vary depending on whether you want to see consortium titles, Advantage titles, or both:

• Consortium
  The consortium products link returns a base digital collection (not including any Advantage titles). You may also hear this collection referred to as the "main" or "primary" collection. See an example of how to find the consortium link.
• Advantage
  The Advantage products link returns only the collection of Advantage titles. See an example of how to find the Advantage link.
• Consortium + Advantage
  This products link returns a collection that includes both consortium and Advantage titles for a specific library or school. See an example of how to find this link.

Query parameters

Once you have the products link, you can add parameters to the URL to narrow your search. Parameter values must be URL-encoded.

*Note: A title's print ISBN may be included in a search response. It's listed under "otherFormatIdentifiers" and kept separate from the digital ISBN, and you cannot search by the print ISBN.

**Note: When you search using the lastTitleUpdateTime or lastUpdateTime parameters, your results will be automatically sorted in ascending order (and other sort options will be ignored).

Always search by lastUpdateTime if you want the most up-to-date information. Newly added records, metadata updates, and changes to availability will all be included in the response. We still recommend that you get a title's real-time availability with the Library Availability API to provide the most accurate information for your users.

Sort options

A call to the products endpoint returns a paginated list of titles as shown in the example below. By default, there are 25 titles per page.

This response includes limited title information and hypermedia links to access the Metadata API or Library Availability API.

In addition to ready-to-circulate titles and titles with wait lists, a digital collection may include:

• Preorders, which can't be borrowed yet but could be placed on hold. Preorder titles are identified in the Metadata API by an onSaleDate that's in the future.
• Weeded titles, which are hidden by the library or school. Weeded titles will show isOwnedByCollections: false in the response.
• Expired titles, which can't be borrowed but could be placed on hold. These titles will show isOwnedByCollections: false in the response.

To learn more about hiding weeded and expired titles in your implementation, see the FAQs.

Getting titles in a curated list

You can see all the titles included in a curated list with the listItems link from the Library Account API. End users can browse the curated lists their library or school creates to discover titles.