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AddThis API Overview

• An API for Every Occasion
• Which One Do I Use?

AddThis offers a number of different APIs, each with a specific purpose. Some of these APIs are client-side, and control how the AddThis sharing tools behave on your page. Others are server-side APIs that you can use for different types of integration between your site and the AddThis backend platform.

Here is a quick overview of the various APIs available, and what you might use them for:

  • Client API: The AddThis Client API is the client-side JavaScript API that you use to add AddThis sharing tools (button, menu, or toolbox) to your web page. When you Get the Code in the AddThis web interface, you are getting code that uses this API. The Client API has a large number of features that let you customize the appearance and behavior of the tools in your page.
  • Sharing Endpoints: The AddThis Sharing Endpoints are a set of simple URL endpoints you can use to initiate sharing to any web site supported by the AddThis platform. Using this API, you can leverage AddThis for sharing, but build your own client side user interface. You can even just link to the API calls directly from your page, which saves you the trouble of having to worry about the URLs for every single destination.
  • Analytics API: The AddThis Analytics API is a web-service you can use to access the analytics data about sharing taking place on your site, without using the AddThis analytics interface. You can use this to build your own reports, for example.
  • Services API: The Services API provides a list of our supported sharing services, along with their icons and service metadata in JSON, JSONP and XML formats.


Which One Do I Use?

Choose the API appropriate for your task.

If you want to...Then you should...
Change the way the AddThis menu looks or acts Use the Client API to change the behavior of the menu. Most of the common customization options are described in Customizing AddThis.
Get direct access to your analytics data If you want direct access to the data you see in the analytics interface on AddThis.com in order to do your own analysis or build your own reports, use the Analytics API.
Add simple sharing buttons to your page, instead of or alongside the full menu AddThis Toolbox is an HTML-based method for adding simple sharing buttons to your page using the Client API, and will let you use code that looks quite a bit like the default code provided in the console. If you want to avoid using the AddThis client side tools altogether, you can just link to the Sharing Endpoints directly.
Roll your own sharing buttons, but still use the AddThis backend The Sharing Endpoints are publicly available URLs that you can pop up or link to directly, saving you the trouble of figuring out or remembering the URLs for all of the different destinations but still being as simple as if you had linked to those directly.

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