Getting Started with SimilarWeb API
Don’t Panic! If you’re reading this, it is safe to assume you are some kind of data geek. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a code guru or don’t know how to write a single line of code – by the end of this short guide you’ll know how to make the most of SimilarWeb’s data via API.
The purpose of the guide is to walk you through the process of getting started. We will review the following issues: Signing up for a free trial account Making a request to the API Monitoring your usage Our Data
1 Signing up for a trial account This is very straightforward and if you already have an account, feel free to proceed to the next chapter. To be on the safe side, let’s go over the steps: 1. Go to http://developer.similarweb.com (Our API site) 2. Click on “Sign Up” 3. Fill the form and hit “Get Started”
4. You will receive a confirmation email in your inbox. If you don’t find it immediately, check your spam folder or search for “SimilarWeb” in your inbox. If all else fails, try again, or contact us. 5. Click on the confirmation link.
6. You’ll be directed to the login page. Please enter your user name and password.
7. You are now ready to make your first API call.
We recommend starting in “Our APIs” section to learn more about all the available data and documentation. If you’re looking for some inspiration and use cases, check out our “Use Cases” page.
2 Making a request to the API All requests are HTTP requests with a programmatic structure of 3 required parameters (Domain, Endpoint, Key) and a few optional parameters, depending on the specifc data you’ll try to retrieve. Browsers can make these requests directly, and most programming languages have libraries for making these calls. Please check out our documentation for an updated view of client libraries and wrappers.
API call format: http://api.similarweb.com/Site/DOMAIN/v1/[ENDPOINT]?[PARAMETER] &Format=[FORMAT]&UserKey=[SECRETKEY]
Example for the Categorization API: http://api.similarweb.com/Site/yahoo.com/v2/category? Format=JSON&UserKey=2f34dd98dd72349a827s2s34
Domain Parameter (Required): All calls requires the domain / subdomain you wish to receive data for. If you want to get only the data relevant to the main domain not including all the subdomains, please include the parameter “md=true" (default is true). Do not add http:// before the domain.
Endpoint Parameter (Required): You must include an endpoint code for every call you make, ba sed on the specic data you’re trying to retrieve. The following table provides an overview of all the available APIs with their endpoints, as well as the relevant parameters.
API FAMILY
API
Traffic
Rank & Reach
DESCRIPTION
Estimated Number of Visits for the domain
SimilarWeb’s Global Rank
HISTORICAL
REQUIRE
DATA
DATE RANGE
12 Months
Yes
1 Month
No
1 Months
GR ANUL ARIT Y
PAGINATION
ENDPOINT
Yes
visits
-
-
traffic
No
-
-
traffic
6 Months
No
Weekly
-
traffic
3 Months
No
-
-
traffic
12 months
Yes
Yes
pageviews
12 months
Yes
12 months
Yes
1 Month
No
1 Month
Monthly / Weekly / Daily
Country Rank - Ranking in the most popular country Traffic Reach - Estimated percentage of the internet users, out of the entire internet traffic, who visited the domain over the last 6 months, week by week
Web Traffic
Traffic Sources Distribution - relative share of each traffic source over the last 3 months." Average Page views per Visit (Website Engagement) Average Visit Duration (Website Engagement)
Average Page views per Visit for the given domain
Average Visit Duration in the given domain
Bounce Rate
Bounce Rate for any of
(Website
the pages in the given
Engagement)
domain
Monthly / Weekly / Daily
Monthly / Weekly / Daily
Monthly /
Yes
visitduration
Yes
bouncerate
-
-
similarsites
No
-
-
alsovisited
1 Month
No
-
-
tags
1 Month
No
-
-
category
1 Month
No
-
-
1 Month
No
-
-
Weekly / Daily
returns 20 similar Similar
websites and their
Websites
similarity score for a given domain receive a list of
Also Visited
additional websites that were frequently visited by the same visitors Returns the 10 top
Website Tags
Tags to any and their relevance score for a given domain
Web Content
returns a given domain’s Website
category based on our
Categorization
content analysis and machine learning return a given domain’s
Category Rank
category and its global rank within its given
CategoryRank
category detect the presence of Adult Websites
adult content for a given domain
Category
API FAMILY
API
DESCRIPTION
HISTORICAL
REQUIRE
DATA
DATE RANGE
3 months
no
GR ANUL ARIT Y
PAGINATION
-
-
Receive the leading Social Referrals
social networks sending traffic to the domain
Organic Search Keywords
ENDPOINT
socialreferringsites
orgsearch
Get access to all the Organic and Paid Search keywords leading to given domain up to 12
12 months
Yes
months back. Output
Monthly / Weekly / Daily
Yes
is paginated (10 results Paid Search
per page).
paidsearch
Keywords
receive the 10 leading Web Traffic
Destinations
Sources
sites that receive direct
leadingdes3 months
No
-
-
clicks from the domain
tinationsites
all the referring websites to a given domain up to Referrals
12 months back. Output
12 months
Yes
is paginated (10 results
Monthly / Weekly / Daily
Yes
referrals
per page).
Organic Keyword Competitors
orgkwcomprovides streamlined
petitor
access to all the domains that are competing against the
12 months
Yes
chosen domain for the
Monthly / Weekly / Daily
Yes
same Organic or Paid Paid Keyword
paidkw-
keywords.
Competitors
competitor
receive the Title, Image, Publisher, Price, Main App Details
Category, Main Category
1 month
No
-
-
1 month
No
-
-
ID, and Rating for a
GetAppDetails
requested app Get estimated range Mobile
Google App
of installs for a given
Installs
app (Available only for
GetAppInstalls
Google Play Store). Receive a list of all Site Related
mobile apps (App Store
Apps
/ Play Store) related to a given domain.
Get1 month
No
-
-
RelatedSiteApps
Time granularity (not all APIs): Some data points require specication of the time granularity of the data being returned. gr = daily / monthly / weekly
Date range (not all APIs): Some data points require specication of the date range of the data being returned in M-YYYY structure. start = M-YYYY / end = M-YYYY
Format (Not mandatory) You can choose if you want to receive the data as JSON or XML. Format = XML / JSON
User Key (Required): Well, you don’t really need an explanation to that, right?
Final Example: http://api.similarweb.com/Site/google.com/v1/visits?gr=weekly&start=52014& end=6-2014 &md=false &Format=JSON UserKey=2f34dd98dd72349a827s2s34
Domain - google.com Endpoint – Visits Granularity – gr=weekly Start Date - start=5-2014 End Date – end=6-2014 Main Domain – md=false Format=JSON UserKey=2f34dd98dd72349a827s2s34
Time granularity (not all APIs):
2014-05-01T00:00:00 19422317108
2014-06-01T00:00:00 18918609379
Date – Time Stamp Value – Number of visits for the given domain.
3 Monitoring Usage We highly recommend you check your usage from time to time in order to understand better your usage habits and see if your quota may be on the wrong side of full. 1. Click on your username on the top right corner of the page:
2. Click on “API Usage”
3. Here you can see how many hits you already used in the specied timeframe:
4. Clicking on “Methods” will help you understand the breakdown among the specic endpoints.
4 Our Data Diverse Sources We have more than a hundred dierent data sources, which helps us assess and compare the quality of our data and eliminate biases. We combine clickstream data from our industry-leading panel with data from our crawler, VPNs, and SDK, to analyze over a billion pages every single month and get an even better snapshot of web and app activity. Unlike some providers, who focus on a specic region or user type, our collection is done on a global scale, with a statistically representative cross-section of all types of consumers. This allows us to reach an unbiased and full understanding of a website's trac.
Size matters When it comes to data, the bigger the panel is, the more statistically accurate the insights will be. We have panel data for tens of millions of users across the world, making our panel the biggest in the industry. We implement big data technologies on our data center consisting of dozens of high-end servers that analyze tens of terabytes of data every week and more than a billion data points every single day. The volume of data we manage and process makes our insights highly accurate and reliable.
Data Treatment Once we have collected volumes of raw data, we use statistical analysis and machine learning techniques to turn it into actionable knowledge. Our raw data is treated with in-house algorithms to remove biases, lter out noisy information, and transform it into meaningful insights. The data from our diversied sources is intelligently combined, normalized, and projected to represent the entire Internet population.
From Data To Insights Our expertise in web trac, marketing analytics, and Internet behavior is what brings our data to life. We work hard to lter our processed data and present it to users in a way that allows them to quickly nd the insights they need. We work hard so that you don't have to. Instead of being overloaded with irrelevant data, we give users focused access to the most relevant intelligence to help them achieve faster and better research.
Questions? Contact us at:
[email protected]
