pinterest api documentation [closed]

Question

Update Aug 2015: Pinterest provides it here now https://dev.pinterest.com/

Is there official or unofficial documentation on the v2 Pinterest API?

Things I know:

• JSON api is in version 2. https://api.pinterest.com/v2 gives you a json response
• People are programming against it because there is a mobile app and beta dev
• Pintrest authentication question on SO
• PHP wrapper for v1 with updates for v2 on Github by Kellan with methods: upload, pin, repin, boards, activity, popular - reading Kellan's code is the best information I could find
• More info on Kellan's work with responses from Pinterest team
• Private unofficial Facebook Pinterest Dev group
• Here are some of the stars behind Pinterest

Update Mar 4 2014 Pinterest has unveiled a beta v3 API which you can request access to. Scroll down the page and you'll see the endpoints listed in the left column. https://developers.pinterest.com/api_docs/

Update Jan 9 2013 Since https://api.pinterest.com/v2 gives a 404, it seems to have been moved to v3. https://api.pinterest.com/v3

{ "status": "failure", "code": 11, "host": "053", "generated_at": "Wed, 09 Jan 2013 10:25:27 +0000", "message": "API method not found.", "data": null } 

Update Nov 19, 2012 The unofficial api documentation at http://tijn.bo.lt/pinterest-api is gone, along with their entire website. I'm leaving the link in this post because it may come back online. Still no word from Pinterest to developers on their api status.

Update May 22, 2012 Pinterest has still not provided a public api. People are connecting to the api endpoints as the iPhone user agent, which is available to the iOS app

Update Apr 17, 2012 Thanks to tijn, we have unofficial version 1(now v2) Pinterest api docs, and reports that only read endpoints are currently available so RSS style feeds are possible within rate limits.

Update Apr 3, 2012 The unofficial Facebook group has some quality info on it and several people asking questions and posting fairly useful responses

Answer 1

I want to offer an update on the current status of the Pinterest API.

There is still no public API available. Pinterest also does not seem to be approving anyone who applies for access on their site.

As of right now, the endpoints of the Pinterest v3 API are almost complete although there is no official documentation. Below is a brief list of the types of endpoints that are available:

https://api.pinterest.com/v3/users/ https://api.pinterest.com/v3/search/ https://api.pinterest.com/v3/domains/ https://api.pinterest.com/v3/categories/ https://api.pinterest.com/v3/oauth/ https://api.pinterest.com/v3/boards/ https://api.pinterest.com/v3/pins/ https://api.pinterest.com/v3/batch/ https://api.pinterest.com/v3/login/ 

You may discover many sub-endpoints to each of the endpoint above. I do have a list of many available endpoints, but since they're not public, I'm not going to post them here (Hint: Most of them are easy to guess). All of the above endpoints require an access_token parameter except for the login endpoint.

To generate a valid access_token, the developer will need to be granted access to the API by Pinterest which we all know is currently almost impossible.

Another option is to write a script to simulate a log in action to the /v3/login endpoint with your Pinterest username and password. It will return an access_token if request is successful. I'm not going into details about how this is done, as this is never meant to be part of the public API and is meant only for users logging into Pinterest on their mobile app.

However, you can generate access token for your Pinterest account for existing apps that have been approved by Pinterest such as the Pinterest for iPhone:

https://www.pinterest.com/oauth/?consumer_id=1431594&response_type=token

You will see that the access_token is returned in the hash of the URL. You can now use this access_token to play with the endpoints and it is valid for one month. Have fun discovering them!

Endpoints that are public and do not require access_token:

Pins with a known username and known board name:

https://api.pinterest.com/v3/pidgets/boards/[username]/[board_name]/pins/

Pins with a known username:

https://api.pinterest.com/v3/pidgets/users/[username]/pins/

Retrieving the information of (a) particular pin(s):

http://api.pinterest.com/v3/pidgets/pins/info/?pin_ids=521150988102375972,10133167885969245

Count the number of pins:

http://api.pinterest.com/v1/urls/count.json?url=[urlEncodedLink]