Brazil Central Bank Open Data API

Free to Use
49 D
Measured Score 0 50 100 Speed 2/30 Consistency 8/20 Security 20/20 Browser access 15/15 Transparency 4/15 TESTED 2026-08-10

Overview

The Brazil Central Bank Open Data API provides free access to official financial and economic data from Brazil s central bank (Banco Central do Brasil). You can retrieve exchange rates, interest rates, economic indicators, and financial statistics without authentication. It is ideal for fintech projects or economic research involving Brazil.

Beginner Tip

Use the time-series endpoint with a known series code (like 1 for exchange rates) and date range; the official data catalog at dadosabertos.bcb.gov.br lists all available series codes.

Measurement Record

What actually happened when we called this API from our own infrastructure. Every value below was recorded by the request, not copied from the provider's documentation.

Request
GET https://api.bcb.gov.br/dados/serie/bcdata.sgs.1/dados?formato=json&dataInicial=01/01/2024&dataFinal=31/01/2024
Result
HTTP 200 · application/json · 859 bytes
Response time
1518 ms (median of 3) · fastest 1051 ms
Transport
TLSv1.3 · TLS_AES_256_GCM_SHA384 · certificate issued by DigiCert Inc
Browser CORS
Allowed — Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *
Recorded
2026-08-10

Fields Returned

Top-level fields present in the response we captured, with the type and value we actually received.

Field Type Value received
data string 02/01/2024
valor string 4.8916

Captured Response

Captured from a real request to https://api.bcb.gov.br/dados/serie/bcdata.sgs.1/dados?formato=json&dataInicial=01/01/2024&dataFinal=31/01/2024 on 2026-08-10. Long arrays and nested objects are truncated to keep the shape readable.

JSON Response · Captured
[
  {
    "data": "02/01/2024",
    "valor": "4.8916"
  }
]

Field Reference

data Date of the data point in dd/mm/yyyy format
valor Numeric value of the economic indicator for that date, returned as a string

Implementation Example

Calls a real endpoint of this API. Replace any placeholder credentials with your own key.

Request
const url = "https://api.bcb.gov.br/dados/serie/bcdata.sgs.1/dados?formato=json&dataInicial=01/01/2024&dataFinal=31/01/2024";
const response = await fetch(url);
if (!response.ok) throw new Error(`Request failed: ${response.status}`);
const data = await response.json();
console.log(data);

What Can You Build?

Note: These code examples are AI-generated and unverified. Always refer to the official API documentation for accurate usage.

How This API Fails

We deliberately sent this API a broken request and recorded exactly what came back on 2026-08-10. Knowing the shape of an error before you hit it makes error handling much easier to write.

HTTP 502 Requesting a path that does not exist text/html

Returned an HTML error page rather than JSON — worth knowing if your client assumes every response can be parsed as JSON.

Common Errors & Troubleshooting

Generated guidance based on this API's documentation, not observed by us. Treat it as a starting point and check against the provider's own error reference.

Invalid series code returns empty array The series code in the URL does not exist or is inactive
Look up valid series codes in the official data catalog at dadosabertos.bcb.gov.br before making requests
Date format error Dates must be in dd/mm/yyyy format, not yyyy-mm-dd
Always format dates as dd/mm/yyyy in the query parameters, for example 01/01/2024
Large response size Requesting years of daily data can return thousands of records
Use the dataInicial and dataFinal parameters to narrow down the date range to what you actually need

Measured Score Breakdown

Live HTTP request to the API endpoint

Speed 2/30
Consistency 8/20
Security 20/20
Browser access 15/15
Transparency 4/15
Endpoint Response Time 1518ms

Fully tested on Aug 10, 2026

Technical Specifications

Auth No Auth
HTTPS REQUIRED
CORS UNKNOWN
Category Government
Difficulty Beginner
Endpoint last called: 2026-08-10

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