Hacker News API Operations Reference

Items

1 operation

GET/item/{id}.json

Get an item by ID

Fetch full details of any HN item

1 path params

Live Data

8 operations

GET/maxitem.json

Get the latest item ID

Retrieve the current highest item ID on Hacker News. This serves as a cursor for discovering all new content — poll from this endpoint periodically and fetch any items with IDs above your last-seen value to capture every new story, comment, and job as it appears.

GET/askstories.json

List Ask HN stories

Get community questions and discussions

GET/showstories.json

List Show HN stories

See new product launches from makers

GET/beststories.json

List best stories

Retrieve the highest-quality story IDs as ranked by Hacker News's best algorithm, which favors sustained engagement over recency. Use this for curating weekly roundups, identifying evergreen content, or surfacing the posts that resonated most with the community.

GET/jobstories.json

List job postings

Browse startup and tech job postings

GET/newstories.json

List newest stories

Get the latest submitted stories

GET/updates.json

List recently changed items and profiles

Get recently changed items and profiles

GET/topstories.json

List top stories

Get trending front page stories

Users

1 operation

GET/user/{id}.json

Get a user profile

Look up a Hacker News user profile

1 path params