COL API

The content included in the Catalogue of Life can be openly accessed through the ChecklistBank API. For a few things, e.g. custom downloads, authentication is required via a GBIF/ChecklistBank user account.

COL Releases in ChecklistBank

ChecklistBank hosts a wide range of datasets including all sources the Catalogue of Life is assembled from. Most datasets in ChecklistBank are not related to the Catalogue of Life at all.

The COL working draft and many releases from COL are available and accessible through the API. In order to access releases or any other dataset in ChecklistBank, you first need to know their integer dataset key. Read the Datasets section in the API introduction to learn about dataset keys for COL releases.