BYTETOOLS

NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center API

Free NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center API with no key: geomagnetic storm alerts, solar flare warnings, Kp index, solar wind and aurora forecasts as JSON products.

No API key requiredCORS enabledHTTPSFree tier

Endpoint tested and returned HTTP 200 on 2026-08-21

What is the NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center API?

The NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center serves free, key-free JSON products covering space weather: official alerts and warnings for geomagnetic storms and solar radiation events, planetary K-index values, real-time solar wind measurements and aurora forecast grids.

SWPC is the United States' official space weather forecaster, and the same alerts that go to power grid operators and airlines are published as plain JSON files at a stable URL. The alerts product returns the operational bulletins verbatim — message codes like `ALTTP2`, serial numbers, NOAA scale ratings and impact statements written for the people who act on them. Reading a live one, as the example does with an M8.1 X-ray flare rated R2 Moderate, is a good deal more informative than any summarised API.

The trade-off is that `message` is human-formatted text with embedded newlines, not structured fields, so extracting the Kp value from an alert means parsing prose. For numeric series use the dedicated products instead: `planetary_k_index_1m.json` for geomagnetic activity, the ACE and DSCOVR solar wind files for real-time plasma data, and the OVATION aurora grids for visibility forecasts. These are static files regenerated on a schedule rather than a query API — there are no parameters, so fetch and filter client-side, and cache according to each product's cadence.

Quick facts

Base URL
https://services.swpc.noaa.gov/products
Authentication
No API key or account. NOAA products are US government work and are not subject to copyright in the United States.
Rate limit
No published limit. Products are regenerated on fixed schedules ranging from one minute to daily; polling faster than the product updates returns identical bytes.
Pricing
Free, with no registration.
CORS
Enabled — callable directly from browser JavaScript
Official docs
Read the docs

How to use the NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center API

Every request below was executed against the live API on 2026-08-21, and the response shown is the real body it returned — not an illustration.

1. Fetch current space weather alerts and warnings

GET https://services.swpc.noaa.gov/products/alerts.json

curl
curl 'https://services.swpc.noaa.gov/products/alerts.json'
JavaScript (fetch)
const res = await fetch("https://services.swpc.noaa.gov/products/alerts.json");
if (!res.ok) throw new Error(`Request failed: ${res.status}`);
const data = await res.json();
console.log(data);
Python (requests)
import requests

res = requests.get("https://services.swpc.noaa.gov/products/alerts.json", timeout=20)
res.raise_for_status()
print(res.json())
Response — HTTP 200 (truncated)
[
  {
    "product_id": "TIIA",
    "issue_datetime": "2026-08-20 20:49:09.870",
    "message": "Space Weather Message Code: ALTTP2\r\nSerial Number: 1523\r\nIssue Time: 2026 Aug 20 2049 UTC\r\n\r\nALERT: Type II Radio Emission \nBegin Time: 2026 Aug 20 1848 UTC\nEstimate Velocity: 927 km/s\nComment: "
  },
  {
    "product_id": "XM5S",
    "issue_datetime": "2026-08-20 12:12:01.710",
    "message": "Space Weather Message Code: SUMXM5\r\nSerial Number: 325\r\nIssue Time: 2026 Aug 20 1212 UTC\r\n\r\nSUMMARY: X-ray Event exceeded M5 \nBegin Time: 2026 Aug 20 1132 UTC\nMaximum Time: 2026 Aug 20 1142 UTC\nEnd Time: 2026 Aug 20 1154 UTC\nXray Class: M8.1\nOptical Class: Sf\nLocation: N04E85\nNoaa Scale: R2 - Moderate\nComment: \r\n\r\nNOAA Scale: R2 - Moderate\r\n\r\nNOAA Space Weather Scale descriptions can be found at\r\nwww.swpc.noaa.gov/noaa-scales-explanation\r\n\r\nPotential Impacts: Area of impact centered primarily on sub-solar point on the sunlit side of Earth.\r\nRadio - Limited blackout of HF (high frequency) radio communication for tens of minutes."
  },
  {
    "product_id": "TIIA",
    "issue_datetime": "2026-08-20 11:58:35.633",
    "message": "Space Weather Message Code: ALTTP2\r\nSerial Number: 1522\r\nIssue Time: 2026 Aug 20 1158 UTC\r\n\r\nALERT: Type II Radio Emission \nBegin Time: 2026 Aug 20 1136 UTC\nEstimate Velocity: 1201 km/s\nComment: SVI\n"
  },
  {
    "product_id": "XM5A",
    "issue_datetime": "2026-08-20 11:39:30.540",
    "message": "Space Weather Message Code: ALTXMF\r\nSerial Number: 540\r\nIssue Time: 2026 Aug 20 1139 UTC\r\n\r\nALERT: X-Ray F

Parameters

ParameterTypeRequiredDescription
(product) alerts.jsonpathOptionalOfficial watches, warnings and alerts as issued, newest first. /products/alerts.json
(product) noaa-planetary-k-index.jsonpathOptionalPlanetary K-index time series, the standard geomagnetic activity measure. /products/noaa-planetary-k-index.json
(product) solar-wind/plasma-2-hour.jsonpathOptionalReal-time solar wind density, speed and temperature from DSCOVR. /products/solar-wind/plasma-2-hour.json
(product) summary/solar-region.jsonpathOptionalCurrent active solar regions and sunspot counts. /products/summary/solar-region.json
(no query parameters)n/aOptionalThese are static generated files. Filter client-side after fetching.

Response fields

product_idstring
Four-character product code identifying the alert type, such as `TIIA` for a Type II radio emission alert.
issue_datetimestring
When SWPC issued the bulletin, in UTC.
messagestring
The full operational bulletin as text, including message code, serial number, NOAA scale rating and potential impacts. Newline-delimited, not structured.
(K-index products)array
Time series products return an array-of-arrays where the first row is the column headers.

What you can build with the NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center API

  • Alert users when a geomagnetic storm may make aurora visible
  • Warn HF radio or satellite operators about solar flare blackouts
  • Plot the Kp index on an amateur radio propagation dashboard
  • Trigger operational procedures from official NOAA storm scales
  • Correlate GPS or grid anomalies with space weather events

Common errors and how to fix them

Unstructured alert text

`message` is an operational bulletin, not parsed fields.

Fix: Parse the `Space Weather Message Code` and `NOAA Scale` lines with a regular expression, or use the numeric products for machine-readable values.

Array-of-arrays with a header row

Time series products use a CSV-like JSON shape.

Fix: The first element is the column names. Zip it against the remaining rows rather than assuming objects.

Identical data on repeated polls

Products regenerate on a fixed cadence.

Fix: Match your polling to the product's update interval — one minute for solar wind, longer for summaries — and cache in between.

404

The product path changed.

Fix: SWPC reorganises product paths occasionally. Check the products directory listing rather than hard-coding deep paths indefinitely.

NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center API — frequently asked questions

Is the NOAA space weather API free?

Yes, entirely free with no key or registration. As US government work the products are not subject to copyright in the United States and can be reused freely.

How do I know if aurora will be visible?

Combine the planetary K-index products with the OVATION aurora forecast grids, which give a probability of visible aurora by location. A Kp of 5 or more is the usual threshold for aurora at mid-latitudes, but local darkness and cloud matter just as much.

Is this a REST API with query parameters?

Not really. SWPC publishes static JSON files that are regenerated on schedule, so there are no query parameters — you fetch a product and filter it yourself. That makes it trivially cacheable at the cost of transferring whole series.

What do the NOAA scale ratings mean?

They are operational severity scales: R for radio blackouts, S for solar radiation storms and G for geomagnetic storms, each numbered 1 to 5. The alert text includes the rating and a plain-language impact statement, which is what operational users act on.

Tools that pair with this API

NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center is an independent third-party service and is not affiliated with ByteTools or ByteVancer. Details on this page were verified on 2026-08-21; always check the official documentation before relying on this API in production, as terms and limits can change.