Oxford Learner’s Dictionaries API

Documentation

Oxford Learner's Dictionaries API

For developers of internet-connected systems, including both Web and mobile applications, Oxford University Press (OUP) offers English language dictionaries as an application programming interface (API) allowing entries to be received and displayed in your own systems.

 

A range of advanced, intermediate, and essential dictionaries, including the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary, is available.

 

Please contact [email protected] to find out more.

 

Using the API for a commercial product or service

You will need a licensing agreement with OUP to use the API for a commercial product or service. Contact for pricing guidelines and a trial API key to evaluate the service.

 

Once a commercial agreement has been reached, your product is subjected to a quality review in which we give you tiered feedback on its design and functionality.

 

If you want to use the Oxford brand in affiliation with your product, you would be required to enter into a separate trademark licence.

 

With the API you can request a list of:

  • possible entries based on the search term data for one entry that best matches the search term
  • 'did you mean?' entries based on a search term
  • entries to implement autocomplete functionality for a partial search term
  • alphabetically near entries based on an entry ID
  • related entries based on an entry ID
  • audio file links for a given entry ID
  • additional features available in the chosen dictionary (usage notes, pictures etc.)
  • entries containing a particular feature

Plus:

  • return a word of the day for a given date
  • return a short preview of a word of the day

NB not all data sets offer all these features.

 

How do I access the API?

We will provide a trial key. This key is subject to volume usage limits (100 API requests every 300 seconds). Un-throttled trial keys can be made available on signature of a simple confidentiality agreement.

 

Documentation

The requests the API responds to are documented at: https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/api/v1/documentation/html

 

Code libraries and sample code for a number of programming languages are available at http://dps.api-lib.idm.fr to help you connect to the API.

 

Data format

The server responds with a body in either JSON or XML format. Within this, actual entry data is returned either as XML or as HTML.

 

Sample CSS is available as a starting point for correct display of HTML dictionary entry text.