Crossref REST API
★ Only Publicly Available OpenAPI DocumentData EnrichmentData Transformationnone17 EndpointsREST
For Agents
Look up scholarly metadata by DOI, ISSN, funder, publisher member, or work type from the public Crossref catalog without authentication.
Use for: I need to look up the metadata for a specific DOI, Find all papers funded by the National Science Foundation, Search for works by a journal's ISSN, List works of type book-chapter on a topic
Not supported: Does not handle DOI registration, full-text article retrieval, or citation counts — use for Crossref scholarly metadata lookup only.
Jentic publishes the only available OpenAPI specification for Crossref REST API, keeping it validated and agent-ready. Crossref is the largest DOI registration agency for scholarly content and exposes a free public REST API for resolving DOIs and querying metadata across works, funders, members, journals, types, licenses, and prefixes. All responses are JSON and no authentication is required, although heavy users are encouraged to identify themselves via a polite mailto. The API powers a wide range of bibliographic, citation, and research-funding tools.
Install Jentic One Beta
Connect the Crossref REST API to your agent
Jentic One is a self-hosted execution layer for AI agents. It lets your agent call the Crossref REST API, or any other public or private API you need. You set the rules, the agent never sees your credentials, and every call is logged.
Two steps, two machines. Install the instance in a safe environment, then register your agent from wherever it runs.
1
Step 1: Jentic One Host machine
# On the machine that will host your Jentic One instance:
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jentic/jentic-one/main/tools/install.sh | sh2
Step 2: Agent machine
# On the machine where your agent runs (keep this separate from the instance):
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jentic/jentic-one/main/tools/install.sh | sh
jentic register # connects your agent to your Jentic One instanceJentic One is in public beta. The setup above keeps your agent separate from the instance, which is what you want before using real credentials: an agent running as the same OS user as Jentic One can read its stored keys directly. Just evaluating? A single local install is fine to start. See the secure deployment guide for the tiers.
Capabilities
What an agent can do with Crossref REST API.
Resolve a DOI to its full Crossref metadata record via /works/{doi}
Search and filter works across the entire Crossref corpus through /works query parameters
List works funded by a specific funder via /funders/{id}/works
List works published by a specific Crossref member via /members/{id}/works
List works in a specific journal by ISSN via /journals/{issn}/works
Look up DOI prefix ownership and the works under a given prefix
Use Cases
Patterns agents use Crossref REST API for, with concrete tasks.
★ DOI-to-Citation Resolution
Power a citation manager or reference renderer by resolving each DOI through GET /works/{doi} and formatting the returned title, authors, container-title, and date into a structured citation. This pattern is the backbone of most reference-management tools and produces consistent metadata across publishers because Crossref normalises across them. Free use makes it suitable for high-volume client-side tools as long as a polite mailto is supplied.
Resolve DOI 10.1038/s41586-020-2649-2 via GET /works/{doi} and extract title, authors, and publication year
Funded-Research Reporting
Generate a report of all works funded by a specific organisation by calling GET /funders/{id}/works with filter and rows parameters. Funding agencies, university research offices, and bibliometrics teams use this to track output associated with a grant ID or funder, then enrich the output with citation counts pulled from other services. Pagination through cursor parameters handles funders with thousands of works.
List the first 100 works funded by funder ID 100000001 published in 2025 and return their DOIs and titles
Journal Coverage Audit
Audit which articles a journal has registered with Crossref by calling GET /journals/{issn}/works with a date filter, useful for librarians confirming completeness of a journal's metadata or for a publisher running QA on their own back catalog. The /journals/{issn} endpoint returns header metadata about the journal itself for context.
Fetch all works in journal ISSN 0028-0836 published since 2024-01-01 and report any DOIs missing abstracts
AI Agent Bibliographic Verification
An AI agent verifies a citation in a manuscript by resolving its DOI through Crossref via Jentic. The agent searches for the crossref_get_work operation, executes against the Crossref public endpoint (no credential needed), and compares the returned title and author list against the manuscript reference list to flag mismatches. Jentic still normalises the call shape so the agent treats Crossref like any other tool.
Use the Jentic SDK to look up a list of DOIs and return any whose Crossref title differs from the manuscript reference
Key Endpoints
17 endpoints — jentic publishes the only available openapi specification for crossref rest api, keeping it validated and agent-ready.
METHOD
PATH
DESCRIPTION
GET
/works
List or search works
GET
/works/{doi}
Get a work by DOI
GET
/funders/{id}/works
List works for a funder
GET
/members/{id}/works
List works for a member
GET
/journals/{issn}/works
List works for a journal
GET
/types/{id}/works
List works by type
GET
/prefixes/{prefix}/works
List works by DOI prefix
GET
/works
List or search works
GET
/works/{doi}
Get a work by DOI
GET
/funders/{id}/works
List works for a funder
GET
/members/{id}/works
List works for a member
GET
/journals/{issn}/works
List works for a journal
GET
/types/{id}/works
List works by type
GET
/prefixes/{prefix}/works
List works by DOI prefix
Why Jentic?
Three things that make agents converge on Jentic-routed access.
Credential isolation
Crossref's public endpoints require no credentials, so there is nothing for Jentic to vault. Jentic still standardises the call shape and adds a polite mailto identifier so the agent automatically gets the better-pool rate limits.
Intent-based discovery
Agents search Jentic with intents like 'look up a DOI' or 'list works by funder' and Jentic returns the matching Crossref operation with its input schema, removing the need to read Crossref's docs.
Time to first call
Direct Crossref integration: a few hours, since there is no auth, but you still need to read the docs for filter syntax and pagination. Through Jentic: minutes — search, load, execute.
Related APIs
Alternatives and complements available in the Jentic catalogue.
FAQs
Specific to using Crossref REST API through Jentic.
Why is there no official OpenAPI spec for Crossref REST API?
Crossref does not publish an OpenAPI specification. Jentic generates and maintains this spec so that AI agents and developers can call Crossref REST API via structured tooling. It is validated against the live API and kept up to date. Get started at https://app.jentic.com/sign-up.
What authentication does the Crossref REST API use?
The Crossref REST API requires no authentication for its public endpoints. Heavy or programmatic users are asked to identify themselves with a polite mailto query parameter or User-Agent so they receive better service and avoid the public pool's rate limits.
Can I retrieve all works funded by a specific funder?
Yes. GET /funders/{id}/works returns the works associated with a Crossref funder ID, and supports filter and pagination parameters so you can scope by date, type, or publisher.
How do I resolve a DOI through Jentic?
Search Jentic for 'look up a DOI', load the operation schema for GET /works/{doi}, and execute with the DOI string. No credential is needed; Jentic still normalises the call so the agent treats Crossref like any other tool in its registry.
How many endpoints does the Crossref REST API expose?
Seventeen GET endpoints across works, funders, members, journals, types, licenses, and prefixes, plus the works-listing variants nested under each.
Is the Crossref API free to use?
Yes. The Crossref public REST API is free and unauthenticated. There is also a paid Plus service tier for users who need guaranteed performance, but the same endpoints work without credentials in the public pool.
GET STARTED