Introduction

Welcome to the Bannerbear API!

Bannerbear is a service that exposes design templates as a simple JSON-based API.

1. Your designer designs a template in Bannerbear
2. We turn it into an API
3. You use this API to generate variations of the template in PNG and JPG format

Authentication

To test your API key:

curl "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/auth"
  -H "Authorization: Bearer API_KEY"

Make sure to replace API_KEY with your API key.

Bannerbear uses API keys to allow access to the API. You can get an API key by creating a project in Bannerbear.

Bannerbear expects the API key to be included in all API requests to the server in a header that looks like the following:

Authorization: Bearer API_KEY

Images

The Images resource is the main resource in Bannerbear. Everything you can do with the Bannerbear API is related in some way to creating Images.

The Image object represents an image you have requested to generate. You generate images by sending a POST request to Bannerbear with a template uid and a list of template modifications you want to apply.

Create an Image

To create an image:

curl "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/images"
  -H "Authorization: Bearer API_KEY"
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" 
  -d json

The above endpoint returns JSON like this:

{
  "created_at": "2020-02-20T07:59:23.077Z",
  "status": "pending",
  "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/images/kG39R5XbvPQpLENKBWJj",
  "uid": "kG39R5XbvPQpLENKBWJj",
  "image_url": null,
  "template": "6A37YJe5qNDmpvWKP0",
  "modifications": [
    {
      "name": "title",
      "text": "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amed",
      "color": null,
      "background": null
    },
    {
      "name": "avatar",
      "image_url": "https://www.bannerbear.com/assets/sample_avatar.jpg"
    }
  ],
  "webhook_url": null,
  "webhook_response_code": null,
  "metadata": null
}

This endpoint creates a new Image.

HTTP Request

POST https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/images

Post Parameters

Send as a JSON object

Parameter	Type	Description
template	string	The template uid you want to use
modifications	array	A list of Modifications you want to make
webhook_url optional	string	A url to POST the Image object to upon rendering completed
metadata optional	string	Metadata that you need to store e.g. ID of a record in your DB

Modification Object

Property	Type	Description
name	string	The name of the item you want to change
text	string	Replacement text you want to use
color	string	Color hex of object e.g. "#FF0000"
background	string	Color hex of text background
image_url	string	Replacement image url you want to use (must be publicly viewable)

All properties are optional, for example if you do not specify a color, the object's default color will be used.

Status

All images are created with the status pending.

Images are usually rendered within a few seconds. When completed, the status changes to completed.

You can poll the GET endpoint for status updates. The self property of the response provides this endpoint.

Image_url

When completed the image url is found in the image_url property of the Image object. It will be in PNG format.

A legacy property named image_url_png also exists but you may ignore this as it is the same url as above. Bannerbear only generates PNGs and no other formats

Webhooks

Instead of polling, we recommended you define a webhook in webhook_url which Bannerbear will POST the Image object to after image rendering is complete.

To secure your webhook endpoint, Bannerbear will POST with the following header:

Authorization: Bearer WEBHOOK_KEY

You can find your project's webhook key in its settings page.

Hotlinking

You may hotlink to image_url in your application.

Get a Specific Image

To get an image:

curl "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/images/kG39R5XbvPQpLENKBWJj"
  -H "Authorization: Bearer API_KEY"

The above endpoint returns JSON like this:

{
  "created_at": "2020-02-20T07:59:23.077Z",
  "status": "completed",
  "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/images/kG39R5XbvPQpLENKBWJj",
  "uid": "kG39R5XbvPQpLENKBWJj",
  "image_url": "https://cdn.bannerbear.com/...",
  "template": "6A37YJe5qNDmpvWKP0",
  "modifications": [
    {
      "name": "title",
      "text": "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amed",
      "color": null,
      "background": null
    },
    {
      "name": "avatar",
      "image_url": "https://www.bannerbear.com/assets/sample_avatar.jpg"
    }
  ],
  "webhook_url": null,
  "webhook_response_code": null,
  "metadata": null
}

This endpoint retrieves a specific Image.

After creating an image request you will receive a uid. You can poll this endpoint to find out when the image has been rendered. When the status is completed the image url will be available in image_url.

HTTP Request

GET https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/images/<uid>

Parameters

Parameter	Description
uid	The uid of the image to retrieve

Templates

Templates are the reusable designs that you create in the Bannerbear editor. You can list a project's templates via the API.

List Templates

To list a project's templates:

curl "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/templates"
  -H "Authorization: Bearer API_KEY"

The above endpoint returns a JSON array like this:

[
  {
    "created_at": "2020-03-17T01:58:07.358Z",
    "name": "Twitter Demo",
    "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/templates/04PK8K2bctXHjqB97O",
    "uid": "04PK8K2bctXHjqB97O",
    "preview_url": null,
    "width": 1000,
    "height": 1000,
    "available_modifications": [
      {
        "name": "avatar",
        "image_url": null
      },
      {
        "name": "name",
        "text": null
      },
      {
        "name": "handle",
        "text": null
      },
      {
        "name": "body",
        "text": null
      }
    ]
  } 
]

This endpoint lists a project's Templates.

This endpoint may be useful for applications with many templates that need to show users a selection, before using the Images endpoint to generate an image based on a chosen template.

HTTP Request

GET https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/templates

Template Preview

Each time you edit a template in Bannerbear, a thumbnail is saved and made available in the preview_url property of the Template object.

Get a Specific Template

To get a template:

curl "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/templates/04PK8K2bctXHjqB97O"
  -H "Authorization: Bearer API_KEY"

The above endpoint returns JSON like this:

{
  "created_at": "2020-03-17T01:58:07.358Z",
  "name": "Twitter Demo",
  "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/templates/04PK8K2bctXHjqB97O",
  "uid": "04PK8K2bctXHjqB97O",
  "preview_url": null,
  "width": 1000,
  "height": 1000,
  "available_modifications": [
    {
      "name": "avatar",
      "image_url": null
    },
    {
      "name": "name",
      "text": null
    },
    {
      "name": "handle",
      "text": null
    },
    {
      "name": "body",
      "text": null
    }
  ]
}

HTTP Request

GET https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/templates/<uid>

Parameters

Parameter	Description
uid	The uid of the template to retrieve

Crawls

The Crawl object represents a crawl you have requested to start. A Crawl extracts data from a webpage in order to generate an Image. Crawls take a url and crawler uid as input. The rules for data extraction are held in the Crawler object.

Start a Crawl

To create a request:

curl "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawls"
  -H "Authorization: Bearer API_KEY"
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" 
  -d json

The above endpoint returns JSON like this:

{
  "url": "https://www.mywebsite.com/my-page.html",
  "created_at": "2020-06-08T07:32:23.902Z",
  "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawls/W7ErAeVjZAb6G1MpNQ",
  "uid": "W7ErAeVjZAb6G1MpNQ",
  "status": "pending",
  "image": null,
  "crawler": "pw2D9Ab16lEl0ayGRN"
}

This endpoint creates a new Crawl.

HTTP Request

POST https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawls

Post Parameters

Send as a JSON object

Parameter	Type	Description
crawler	string	The crawler uid you want to use
url	string	A publicly-viewable url you want to crawl
webhook_url optional	string	A url to POST the Image object to upon rendering completed

Status

All crawls are created with the status pending.

End to end, a crawl usually takes a few seconds.

The url is crawled, after which an Image generation operation starts. When finished, the status changes to completed and the full Image object is available in the image property of the Crawl object.

You can poll the GET endpoint for status updates. The self property of the response provides this endpoint.

Webhooks

Instead of polling, we recommended you define a webhook in webhook_url which Bannerbear will POST the Image object to after image rendering is complete. The rendered image url is found in the image_url property of the Image object.

Get a Specific Crawl

To get a crawl:

curl "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawls/W7ErAeVjZAb6G1MpNQ"
  -H "Authorization: Bearer API_KEY"

The above endpoint returns JSON like this:

{
  "url": "https://www.mywebsite.com/my-page.html",
  "created_at": "2020-06-08T07:32:23.902Z",
  "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawls/W7ErAeVjZAb6G1MpNQ",
  "uid": "W7ErAeVjZAb6G1MpNQ",
  "status": "completed",
  "image": {
    "created_at": "2020-06-09T03:09:41.306Z",
    "status": "completed",
    "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/images/yMRj52Zwoa6xZ5YxWkdO3eE9P",
    "uid": "yMRj52Zwoa6xZ5YxWkdO3eE9P",
    "image_url": "https://cdn.bannerbear.com/...",
    "template": "p6jq8BX57gY5nlwWaK",
    "modifications": [
      {
        "name": "title",
        "text": "This is a title"
      }
    ],
    "webhook_url": null,
    "webhook_response_code": null,
    "metadata": null
  },
  "crawler": "pw2D9Ab16lEl0ayGRN"
}

This endpoint retrieves a specific Crawl.

After starting a crawl you will receive a uid. You can poll this endpoint to find out when the image has been rendered from the crawl. When the status is completed the full Image object will be available in the image key of the Crawl object.

HTTP Request

GET https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawls/<uid>

Parameters

Parameter	Description
uid	The uid of the crawl to retrieve

Crawlers

The Crawler object represents a set of CSS selectors to use for data extraction from a website. Crawler configuration can be edited via the Bannerbear control panel.

Crawlers belong to a Template which is included in the response object.

List Crawlers

To list a project's crawlers:

curl "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawlers"
  -H "Authorization: Bearer API_KEY"

The above endpoint returns a JSON array like this:

[
  {
    "domain": "mywebsite.com",
    "created_at": "2020-06-08T01:39:31.101Z",
    "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawlers/pw2D9Ab16lEl0ayGRN",
    "uid": "pw2D9Ab16lEl0ayGRN",
    "config": {
      "poster": {
        "selector": "meta[name=\"twitter:image:src\"]",
        "attribute": "content"
      },
      "title": {
        "selector": "h1"
      }
    },
    "template": {
      "created_at": "2020-06-05T21:59:34.361Z",
      "name": "Template 25",
      "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/templates/p6jq8BX57gY5nlwWaK",
      "uid": "p6jq8BX57gY5nlwWaK",
      "preview_url": "https://cdn.bannerbear.com/...",
      "width": 1200,
      "height": 630,
      "available_modifications": [
        {
          "name": "poster",
          "image_url": null
        },
        {
          "name": "title",
          "text": null,
          "color": null,
          "background": null
        }
      ]
    }
  }
]

This endpoint lists a project's available Crawlers.

HTTP Request

GET https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawlers

Get a Specific Crawler

To get a crawler:

curl "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawlers/pw2D9Ab16lEl0ayGRN"
  -H "Authorization: Bearer API_KEY"

The above endpoint returns JSON like this:

{
  "domain": "mywebsite.com",
  "created_at": "2020-06-08T01:39:31.101Z",
  "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawlers/pw2D9Ab16lEl0ayGRN",
  "uid": "pw2D9Ab16lEl0ayGRN",
  "config": {
    "poster": {
      "selector": "meta[name=\"twitter:image:src\"]",
      "attribute": "content"
    },
    "title": {
      "selector": "h1"
    }
  },
  "template": {
    "created_at": "2020-06-05T21:59:34.361Z",
    "name": "Template 25",
    "self": "https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/templates/p6jq8BX57gY5nlwWaK",
    "uid": "p6jq8BX57gY5nlwWaK",
    "preview_url": "https://cdn.bannerbear.com/...",
    "width": 1200,
    "height": 630,
    "available_modifications": [
      {
        "name": "poster",
        "image_url": null
      },
      {
        "name": "title",
        "text": null,
        "color": null,
        "background": null
      }
    ]
  }
}

HTTP Request

GET https://api.bannerbear.com/v2/crawlers/<uid>

Parameters

Parameter	Description
uid	The uid of the crawler to retrieve

Errors

The Bannerbear API uses the following error codes:

Error Code	Meaning
202	Accepted -- Your request is has been accepted for processing
200	OK
400	Bad Request -- Your request is invalid.
401	Unauthorized -- Your API key is wrong.
404	Not Found -- The specified request could not be found.
429	Too Many Requests -- Slow down!
500	Internal Server Error -- We had a problem with our server. Try again later.
503	Service Unavailable -- We're temporarily offline for maintenance. Please try again later.

The Bannerbear API rate limit is 10 requests per 10 seconds.