Data citation is a key component of open science, and is important for transparency and reproducibility of research. Being able to locate the data used or generated by a piece of research helps others to verify and build on it. Everyone benefits when research data is transparent and visible, and to support this, Crossref participates in the Make Data Count initiative.
The data citation endpoint returns connections between content items deposited by Crossref members and known datasets. The metadata is sourced from references and relationships deposited by Crossref members, and linked to datasets with either a Crossref or DataCite DOI. Note that no matching is carried out, so the metadata must include a dataset DOI.
On this page:
See the API documentation to try out the API and for further details, including endpoints, request parameters, and response fields.
Data citations added to the API in a time range:
https://api-crossref-org.ezproxy.galter.northwestern.edu/beta/datacitations/?from-created-date=2026-01-20T00:00:00&until-created-date=2026-01-21T12:00:00
Data citations from a specific member:
https://api-crossref-org.ezproxy.galter.northwestern.edu/beta/datacitations/?member-id=78
Citations to a specific dataset:
https://api-crossref-org.ezproxy.galter.northwestern.edu/beta/datacitations/?object-id=10.1037/e495862006-009
Data sources: The API scans all items in the reference and relation fields of recently updated works. New data citations are added to the API for any that include a DataCite DOI where resourceTypeGeneral is Dataset, or a Crossref DOIs where the type is dataset. Due to technical constraints, in the beta version there is a delay of 5 days between metadata being deposited by members and appearing in the data citation API.
Output format: The output format is similar to Event Data although some field names have been changed for clarity. See the Swagger documentation for definitions of output fields.
Authentication and access: No authentication is required to access the service. While the service is in beta, we request that you include a mailto parameter so that we can contact you in case there are any issues with your requests, or if we plan to make substantial changes to the service.
Usage limits: Users may make up to 3 requests concurrently, at a rate of 3 requests per second. Rate limits are included in the response headers. An HTTP response code of 429 indicates that you have been rate limited. Check the HTTP response codes for requests, and back off or make changes if you see a high rate of unsuccessful requests.