Disclaimer: The OANDA API is currently available for use in our developer sandbox, where you are free to develop and test your apps. To use the API with production accounts, please email us at api@oanda.com.

We want to make it easy for software developers to tap into the forex market. There are a lot of financial API's out there that leave us scratching our heads. Enter the OANDA API. This API will empower you to do all things forex. Want an exchange rate? Easy. A list of open trades? Done. Notifications? Childs play. This guide will lay out for you, step by step, what you need to get started trading forex with the OANDA API.

Your first request

Before getting into the details below, let's try using the API. Issue the following GET request using your favourite HTTP client. The response will tell you what price EUR/USD is currently trading at. Seriously, try it out.

http://api-sandbox.oanda.com/v1/instruments/EUR_USD/price

You'll get back some JSON that looks like:

{
    "instrument":"EUR_USD",
    "time":1353974468.336059,
    "bid":1.29838,
    "ask":1.29844
}

This response tells us that at the time we made the request (epoch time), the bid price of EUR/USD is 1.29838, and the ask price is 1.29844.

Getting Started

• Check out our getting started guide
• Check out a few example apps that use the API
• Check out our documentation to see what we offer

Describing the API

All requests will use http://api-sandbox.oanda.com as the base url, and follow the convention in the diagram below.

• An action (CRUD) can be performed on a resource
• A resource belongs to a collection
• A collection exists under a version

One or more CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) operations can be performed on a single URL, depending on the action desired.

POST (Create)	POST requests are used to submit new data
GET (Read)	GET requests are used to read data
PUT (Update)	PUT requests are used to modify existing data
DELETE (Delete)	DELETE requests are used to delete data

##Authentication

In order to trade, you will need an OANDA account id. Creating a new user will automatically generate a new account id for you. While our API is still being drafted, you will not need your username/password for any purpose other than creating an account. Please be respectful of others by not trading on accounts that you don't own.

Request and Response

All requests require Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded unless specified otherwise.

All response will be in JSON format.

Handling errors

When an error occurs, the applicable HTTP response code is returned as well as an error message in the body in the following format:

{
    "errorCode" : [OANDA error code, may or may kot be the same as the HTTP status code],
    "message"   : [a description of the error which occurred, intended for developers],
    "moreInfo"  : [a link to a web page describing the error and possible causes and solutions]
}

More on error codes

Trading API Overview

Resource	URI	Methods	Description
user	/users/:username	POST	User registration, user profile
account	/accounts/:account_id	GET	Contains account information for a specific account
account collection	/accounts	GET	Contains list of accounts for a specific user
trade	/accounts/:account_id/trades/:trade_id	GET, PUT, DELETE	Contains info of a specific trade.
trade collection	/accounts/:id/trades	GET, POST	Contain a list of trade for a specific account. Use POST to create new trades
order	/accounts/:account_id/orders/:order_id	GET, PUT, DELETE	Contains info of a specific order. GET to retrieve info. PUT to change, DELETE to delete.
order collection	/accounts/:account_id/orders	GET, POST	Contain a list of trade for a specific account. Use POST to create new trades
position collection	/accounts/:account_id/position	GET, DELETE	Contain a list of positions for a specific account. Use GET to retrieve. DELTE to delete existing position.
transaction	/accounts/:account_id/transactions/:trans_id	GET	Contains info of a specific transaction.
transaction collection	/accounts/:account_id/transaction	GET	Contains info of a list transactions.
rates			Market rates data.