Curated List of Free APIs for Fun Projects

A collection of fun, interesting, and free APIs that developers can use for practice, prototypes, learning, or just building cool stuff!

Why This List?

Finding reliable, genuinely free, and easy-to-use APIs can be time-consuming. This list aims to provide a quick reference for developers, especially beginners, looking for APIs to integrate into their projects without worrying about credit cards or complex enterprise setups. We focus on APIs with generous free tiers suitable for personal projects and experimentation.

Table of Contents

• Animals
• Anime
• Books
• Data & JSON Placeholders
• Games
• Maps
• Jokes & Fun
• Music
• Photos
• Science & Space
• Utilities
• Weather

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Animals

• Cat Facts
  • Description: Get random cat facts. Simple and fun.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes
• The Dog API
  • Description: High-quality images of dogs. Breed information available too.
  • Auth: apiKey (Optional for some endpoints, required for others - free key available)
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes
• RandomFox
  • Description: Get a random image URL of a fox. Extremely simple.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes

Anime

• Jikan API
  • Description: Unofficial MyAnimeList API. Provides extensive data about anime, manga, characters, etc. Respect their rate limits.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes

Books

• Open Library APIs
  • Description: Access data about books, authors, and editions from the Internet Archive's Open Library project.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes

Data & JSON Placeholders

• JSONPlaceholder
  • Description: Fake Online REST API for Testing and Prototyping. Provides typical placeholder data (users, posts, comments, etc.).
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes
• Fake Store API
  • Description: Fake REST API for e-commerce or shopping website prototypes. Includes products, carts, users.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes

Games

• PokéAPI
  • Description: All the Pokémon data you'll ever need, in one place. Very comprehensive.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes
• RAWG Video Games Database API
  • Description: Access data for 500,000+ games, genres, platforms, publishers, etc. Requires a free API key.
  • Auth: apiKey
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Unknown (Check Docs/Test)

Maps

• OpenStreetMap (Nominatim)
  • Description: Provides geocoding (search place names for coordinates) and reverse geocoding based on OpenStreetMap data. Has fair usage policy limits.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes

Jokes & Fun

• Official Joke API (Docs link to GitHub repo)
  • Description: Simple API for random jokes, including programming jokes. Endpoints provided in the repo's README.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes
• Open Trivia Database
  • Description: Provides trivia questions with customizable categories, difficulty, and types.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes

Music

• Deezer API
  • Description: Search for artists, albums, tracks, playlists. Play 30-second previews. Requires user authentication (OAuth) for some features but public data is accessible.
  • Auth: No / OAuth
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Unknown (Client-side SDK available)

Photos

• Picsum Photos
  • Description: Easy placeholder images. Get random images or specific images by ID, with options for size, grayscale, blur.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes

Science & Space

• NASA APIs
  • Description: A wealth of space and earth science data, including the famous APOD (Astronomy Picture of the Day). Most require a free API key.
  • Auth: apiKey (Generally required, free key available)
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes

Utilities

• IPify
  • Description: A simple public IP address API. Get your public IP address or use their lookup service.
  • Auth: No
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes

Weather

• OpenWeatherMap API
  • Description: Current weather data, forecasts, and historical data. Free tier available with API key requirement and usage limits.
  • Auth: apiKey
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes (Check specific endpoints/plan)
• WeatherAPI.com
  • Description: Realtime, forecast, history, astronomy, sports weather data. Free tier requires API key and has limits.
  • Auth: apiKey
  • HTTPS: Yes
  • CORS: Yes