Overview
The Materials Platform for Data Science (MPDS) API provides access to curated experimental data about materials — things like crystal structures, physical properties, and phase diagrams. It is designed for researchers and scientists who want programmatic access to reliable materials science datasets. You will need an API key to get started, which you can request on their website.
Beginner Tip
Start with simple property queries like band gap or melting point for well-known materials such as silicon or iron to understand the response structure before building complex queries.
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.mpds.io/v1/
- Result
- HTTP 200 · application/json · 924 bytes
- Response time
- 1398 ms (median of 3) · fastest 564 ms
- Transport
- TLSv1.3 · TLS_AES_256_GCM_SHA384
- Browser CORS
- Allowed — Access-Control-Allow-Origin: https://apisscore.com
- Served by
- nginx
- 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 |
|---|---|---|
| type | string | info |
| attributes | object | {5 fields} |
Captured Response
Captured from a real request to https://api.mpds.io/v1/ on 2026-08-10. Long arrays and nested objects are truncated to keep the shape readable.
{
"meta": {
"api_version": "1.0.0",
"provider": {
"name": "Materials Platform for Data Science",
"description": "MPDS Optimade Endpoint",
"prefix": "mpds",
"homepage": "https://mpds.io"
},
"implementation": {
"name": "Materials Platform for Data Science",
"homepage": "https://developer.mpds.io",
"maintainer": {
"…": "(1 more fields)"
},
"version": "1.2.5",
"issue_tracker": "https://github.com/mpds-io/mpds-api/issues"
},
"more_data_available": false,
"data_available": 2933475,
"time_stamp": "2026-08-10 19:53:22",
"query": {
"representation": "/info"
},
"data_returned": 1
},
"data": {
"type": "info",
"attributes": {
"api_version": "1.0.0",
"available_api_versions": [
{
"…": "(2 more fields)"
}
],
"available_endpoints": [
"structures"
],
"formats": [
"json"
],
"entry_types_by_format": {
"…": "(1 more fields)"
}
}
}
} Implementation Example
Calls a real endpoint of this API. Replace any placeholder credentials with your own key.
const url = "https://api.mpds.io/v0/data/facet?q={";
// Replace headers or query params with the values required by this API.
const response = await fetch(url, {
headers: {
"X-API-Key": "YOUR_API_KEY"
}
});
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.
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.
Measured Score Breakdown
Live HTTP request to the API endpoint
Fully tested on Aug 10, 2026
Technical Specifications
Related Tags
Similar APIs
View All →CORE
CORE provides access to millions of open-access research papers from repositories and journals worldwide.
Numbers
The Numbers API from math.tools provides facts, trivia, and mathematical data about numbers — including the number of the day, random numbers, and detailed number properties.
arcsecond.io
⭐ Beginner's Pickarcsecond.io is a free astronomy API that aggregates data from multiple space databases, including stars, planets, exoplanets, and observing sites.
GBIF
⭐ Beginner's PickGBIF (Global Biodiversity Information Facility) is a free, open API providing access to hundreds of millions of species occurrence records from around the world.
ISRO
⭐ Beginner's PickISRO is a free, no-auth API that provides detailed information about the Indian Space Research Organisation spacecraft and missions.