GOV.UK Search API
Free GOV.UK Search API with no key: search all UK government content — guidance, news, forms, statistics and services — with filtering and facets. Tested.
Endpoint tested and returned HTTP 200 on 2026-08-20
What is the GOV.UK Search API?
The GOV.UK Search API is a free, key-free API for searching all content published on GOV.UK — guidance, services, news, consultations, statistics and forms — across every UK government department.
GOV.UK is the single publishing platform for all UK central government, and this API searches the entire corpus. That makes it the authoritative route to government guidance rather than scraping departmental sites.
Filtering by `content_store_document_type` and organisation is what makes it practical: you can restrict to statistical releases from one department, or to guidance pages only, rather than sifting the whole estate.
Quick facts
- Base URL
https://www.gov.uk/api- Authentication
- No API key required.
- Rate limit
- No published hard limit; reasonable use expected.
- Pricing
- Free under the Open Government Licence.
- CORS
- Enabled — callable directly from browser JavaScript
- Official docs
- Read the docs
How to use the GOV.UK Search API
Every request below was executed against the live API on 2026-08-20, and the response shown is the real body it returned — not an illustration.
1. Search GOV.UK content
GET https://www.gov.uk/api/search.json?count=1
curl 'https://www.gov.uk/api/search.json?count=1'const res = await fetch("https://www.gov.uk/api/search.json?count=1");
if (!res.ok) throw new Error(`Request failed: ${res.status}`);
const data = await res.json();
console.log(data);import requests
res = requests.get("https://www.gov.uk/api/search.json?count=1", timeout=20)
res.raise_for_status()
print(res.json()){
"results": [
{
"description": "Sign in to your Universal Credit account - report a change, add a note to your journal, see your payments and do other tasks ",
"format": "transaction",
"link": "/sign-in-universal-credit",
"organisations": [
{
"organisation_type": "ministerial_department",
"organisation_state": "live",
"superseding_organisations": [],
"acronym": "DWP",
"content_id": "b548a09f-8b35-4104-89f4-f1a40bf3136d",
"link": "/government/organisations/department-for-work-pensions",
"parent_organisations": [],
"superseded_organisations": [
"department-of-social-security",
"pension-service",
"pension-disability-and-carers-service",
"disability-and-carers-service",
"bpdts-ltd"
],
"analytics_identifier": "D10",
"title": "Department for Work and Pensions",
"organisation_crest": "single-identity",
"organisation_brand": "department-for-work-pensions",
"child_organisations": [
"equality-2025",
"industrial-injuries-advisory-council",
"social-security-advisory-committee",
"health-and-safety-executive",
"the-pensions-advisory-service",
"the-pensions-regulator",
"pension-protection-fund-ombudsman",
"pensions-ombudsman",
"national-employment-savings-trust",
"remploy-ltd",
"pension-protection-fund",
"indepenParameters
| Parameter | Type | Required | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
search.json | path | Required | The search endpoint. search.json |
q | string | Optional | Search query. universal credit |
count | integer | Optional | Results per page, max 1000. 10 |
start | integer | Optional | Pagination offset. 10 |
filter_content_store_document_type | string | Optional | Restrict to a content type. guidance |
filter_organisations | string | Optional | Restrict to a department slug. hm-revenue-customs |
Response fields
resultsarray- Matching content items.
results[].titlestring- Page title.
results[].descriptionstring- Page summary.
results[].linkstring- Path on GOV.UK — prefix with the domain.
results[].public_timestampstring- When the content was last updated.
results[].content_store_document_typestring- guidance, news_story, statistics and so on.
totalinteger- Total matching results.
What you can build with the GOV.UK Search API
- Surface official government guidance inside a product
- Monitor GOV.UK for new publications on a topic
- Build a government service finder
- Track policy and statistical releases by department
Common errors and how to fix them
link is a path, not a URL
Results return site-relative paths.
Fix: Prefix with https://www.gov.uk to build a working link.
Too many irrelevant results
The corpus is enormous.
Fix: Filter by content type and organisation rather than relying on the query alone.
Content changes without notice
Government guidance is updated frequently.
Fix: Do not cache indefinitely; check public_timestamp.
GOV.UK Search API — frequently asked questions
Is the GOV.UK API free?
Yes, free with no API key under the Open Government Licence, which requires attribution.
What content does it cover?
Everything published on GOV.UK — guidance, services, news, consultations, statistics and forms — across all UK central government departments.
Why are the links relative?
Results return site-relative paths such as /universal-credit. Prefix them with https://www.gov.uk to build working links.
How do I narrow results to one department?
Use filter_organisations with the department slug, optionally combined with filter_content_store_document_type to restrict to guidance or statistics.
Tools that pair with this API
JSON Formatter
Format, beautify and minify JSON online with 2-space, 4-space or tab indentation. Sort keys alphabetically and catch syntax errors instantly — free and private.
Word Counter
Count words, characters, sentences, paragraphs and estimated reading time instantly. Free online word counter for essays, blogs and social media.
GOV.UK Search is an independent third-party service and is not affiliated with ByteTools or ByteVancer. Details on this page were verified on 2026-08-20; always check the official documentation before relying on this API in production, as terms and limits can change.