---
title: "API overview"
canonical_url: "https://www.nutrient.io/guides/dws-data-extraction/api-overview/"
md_url: "https://www.nutrient.io/guides/dws-data-extraction/api-overview.md"
last_updated: "2026-05-26T22:37:31.557Z"
description: "DWS Data Extraction API base URL, authentication, and available capabilities."
---

# API overview

The Data Extraction API is an HTTP API hosted at `https://api.nutrient.io`. It provides endpoint-specific capabilities for extracting structured content from documents.

## Base URL

```

https://api.nutrient.io

```

All endpoints are relative to this base URL.

## Authentication

Include your API key in the `Authorization` header with every request:

```

Authorization: Bearer pdf_live_...

```

API keys are available in the [Data Extraction API dashboard](https://dashboard.nutrient.io/). Keys starting with `pdf_live_` are for production use. Keys starting with `pdf_test_` are for testing with limitations.

## Available endpoints

| Endpoint                          | Description                                                                                                                                                                                |
| --------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |
| [`POST /extraction/parse`](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/dws-data-extraction/parsing/) | Extract structured elements or Markdown from documents. Supports four processing modes (`text`, `structure`, `understand`, `agentic`) and two output formats (spatial elements, Markdown). |

## Further details

- [Supported languages](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/dws-data-extraction/supported-languages.md) — Full list of 100+ OCR languages with ISO codes and aliases.

- [Supported file types](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/dws-data-extraction/file-types.md) — PDFs, images, and Office files accepted by the API.

- [Error handling](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/dws-data-extraction/errors.md) — HTTP status codes, error response format, and troubleshooting.
---

## Related pages

- [Supported file types](/guides/dws-data-extraction/file-types.md)
- [Error handling](/guides/dws-data-extraction/errors.md)
- [Get started](/guides/dws-data-extraction/getting-started.md)
- [DWS Data Extraction API](/guides/dws-data-extraction.md)
- [Support](/guides/dws-data-extraction/support.md)
- [Security](/guides/dws-data-extraction/security.md)
- [Privacy](/guides/dws-data-extraction/privacy.md)
- [Supported languages](/guides/dws-data-extraction/supported-languages.md)