The Cat API

An open, free, read and write API all about cats. Access thousands of cat images, vote, favorite, and explore breed information.

The Cat API publishes 5 APIs on the APIs.io network, including Breeds API, Categories API, Favourites API, and 2 more. Tagged areas include Animals, Cats, Image, and Media.

The The Cat API catalog on APIs.io includes 1 JSON-LD context and 2 Spectral governance rulesets.

The Cat API’s developer surface includes authentication, documentation, signup flow, pricing, and 5 more developer resources.

🌐 Visit website 📡 Source on GitHub

31.7/100 thin ▬ flat Agent 28/100 agent aware Full breakdown ↓
scored 2026-08-25 · rubric v0.14.0

AccessFreemiumSelf serve⚡ Free to try

5 APIs

Animals Cats Image Media

Kin Score

Kin Score How this is scored →
scored 2026-08-25 · rubric v0.14.0

Composite quality — 31.7/100 · thin

Contract Quality 15.0 / 25

Developer Ergonomics 2.4 / 20

Access Clarity 5.8 / 20

Operational Transparency 1.4 / 13

Contract Governance 1.6 / 12

Discoverability 5.6 / 10

Agent readiness — 28/100 · agent aware

Machine-Readable Contract 18 / 18

Agentic Access Contract 10 / 10

Documented Reversibility 0 / 6

MCP Server 0 / 12

Machine-Readable Auth 10 / 10

Idempotency 0 / 9

Stable Error Semantics 8 / 8

Request/Response Examples 7 / 7

Rate-Limit Signaling 7 / 7

Typed Event Surface 0 / 6

Agent Skills 0 / 5

Well-Known Catalog 0 / 4

Consent & Bot Identity 0 / 3

A2A Agent Card 0 / 8

Dry-Run / Simulate Mode 0 / 4

Delegated User Identity 0 / 6

Protected Resource Metadata 0 / 5

Registration Without a Human 0 / 6

Agentic Commerce Surface 0 / 5

Improve this rating by publishing the missing artifacts — every area above can be raised, and the full rubric is at apis.io/rating/. This rating is computed from github.com/api-evangelist/the-cat-api: open an issue to ask a question, or submit a pull request to add artifacts. Want it done for you? Prioritized profiling — $2,500 →

APIs 5

Individual APIs this provider publishes, each with its own machine-readable definition.

The Cat API Breeds API

List, search, and retrieve cat breed information.

The Cat API Categories API

Retrieve available image categories.

The Cat API Favourites API

Manage user favourite cat images.

The Cat API Images API

Search, upload, retrieve, and delete cat images.

The Cat API Votes API

Cast and manage votes on cat images.

Open Collections 7

Open, tool-agnostic API collections (OpenAPI-derived and Bruno).

API Collection

OPEN COLLECTION

The Cat Breeds API

OPEN COLLECTION

The Cat Breeds Categories API

OPEN COLLECTION

The Cat Breeds Favourites API

OPEN COLLECTION

The Cat Breeds Images API

OPEN COLLECTION

The Cat Breeds Votes API

OPEN COLLECTION

The Cat API

OPEN COLLECTION

Scroll for all 7

Pricing Plans 1

Published pricing tiers and plan structures.

The Cat Api Plans Pricing

3 plans

PLANS

Rate Limits 1

Documented rate limits and quota policies.

The Cat Api Rate Limits

5 limits

RATE LIMITS

FinOps 1

Cost, billing, and metering signals for API financial operations.

The Cat Api Finops

FINOPS

Semantic Vocabularies 1

JSON-LD contexts and semantic vocabularies used across these APIs.

The Cat Api Context

3 classes · 21 properties

JSON-LD

Spectral Rules 2

Spectral governance rulesets for linting and validating these APIs.

The Cat API API Rules

5 rules · 4 warnings 1 info

SPECTRAL

The Cat API API Rules

10 rules · 3 errors 7 warnings

SPECTRAL

JSON Schema 2

Standalone JSON Schema definitions for this provider's data models.

Cat API Breed

26 properties

JSON SCHEMA

Cat API Image

6 properties

JSON SCHEMA

JSON Structure 1

JSON Structure definitions describing this provider's data shapes.

The Cat Api Image Search Structure

0 properties

JSON STRUCTURE

Examples 3

Example request and response payloads for these APIs.

The Cat Api Createvote Example

2 fields

EXAMPLE

The Cat Api Listbreeds Example

2 fields

EXAMPLE

The Cat Api Searchimages Example

2 fields

EXAMPLE

Security Posture 2

Authentication, domain security, vulnerability disclosure, and trust-center signals.

The Cat Api Authentication

apiKey · 1 scheme

SECURITY

The Cat Api Domain Security

TLSv1.3 · HSTS

SECURITY

Agentic Access 1

Recommended x-agentic-access execution contracts for AI agents.

The Cat Api Agentic Access

17 operations · 6 acting

AGENTIC

Resources

Get Started 1

Portal, sign-up, and the first successful call

Signup

Signup

Documentation 2

Reference material describing how the API behaves

Documentation

Documentation

OpenAPI

OpenAPI

Agent Surfaces 1

MCP servers, agent skills, and machine-readable catalogs

AgenticAccess

AgenticAccess

Build 1

SDKs, sample code, and the tooling you integrate with

GitHubOrganization

GitHubOrganization

Access & Security 2

Authentication, authorization, and security posture

DomainSecurity

DomainSecurity

Authentication

Authentication

Commercial 1

Pricing, plans, and the legal terms of use

Pricing

Pricing

Company 1

The organization behind the API

Website

Website

Source (apis.yml)

aid: the-cat-api
name: The Cat API
description: An open, free, read and write API all about cats. Access thousands of cat images, vote, favorite, and explore
  breed information.
type: Index
accessModel:
  pricing: freemium
  onboarding: self-serve
  trial: false
  try_now: true
  public: false
  label: Freemium · Self-serve signup
  confidence: high
  source:
  - plans
  - authentication
  generated: '2026-07-22'
  method: derived
position: Consumer
access: 3rd-Party
image: https://kinlane-images.s3.amazonaws.com/shared/apis-json/icons/the-cat-api.png
tags:
- Animals
- Cats
- Image
- Media
tags_raw:
- Animals
- Cats
- Images
- Media
created: '2025-01-07'
modified: '2026-05-19'
url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/the-cat-api/refs/heads/main/apis.yml
specificationVersion: '0.23'
apis:
- aid: the-cat-api:the-cat-api-breeds-api
  name: The Cat API Breeds API
  description: List, search, and retrieve cat breed information.
  humanURL: https://thecatapi.com/
  baseURL: https://api.thecatapi.com/v1
  tags:
  - Breeds
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/the-cat-api-breeds-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/
  - type: Signup
    url: https://account.thecatapi.com/
  - type: GettingStarted
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/view-account/ylX4blBYT9FaoVd6OhvR?report=bOoeBGLXVHoGjXfjeHLFo5lFU
- aid: the-cat-api:the-cat-api-categories-api
  name: The Cat API Categories API
  description: Retrieve available image categories.
  humanURL: https://thecatapi.com/
  baseURL: https://api.thecatapi.com/v1
  tags:
  - Categories
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/the-cat-api-categories-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/
  - type: Signup
    url: https://account.thecatapi.com/
  - type: GettingStarted
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/view-account/ylX4blBYT9FaoVd6OhvR?report=bOoeBGLXVHoGjXfjeHLFo5lFU
- aid: the-cat-api:the-cat-api-favourites-api
  name: The Cat API Favourites API
  description: Manage user favourite cat images.
  humanURL: https://thecatapi.com/
  baseURL: https://api.thecatapi.com/v1
  tags:
  - Favourites
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/the-cat-api-favourites-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/
  - type: Signup
    url: https://account.thecatapi.com/
  - type: GettingStarted
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/view-account/ylX4blBYT9FaoVd6OhvR?report=bOoeBGLXVHoGjXfjeHLFo5lFU
- aid: the-cat-api:the-cat-api-images-api
  name: The Cat API Images API
  description: Search, upload, retrieve, and delete cat images.
  humanURL: https://thecatapi.com/
  baseURL: https://api.thecatapi.com/v1
  tags:
  - Image
  tags_raw:
  - Images
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/the-cat-api-images-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/
  - type: Signup
    url: https://account.thecatapi.com/
  - type: GettingStarted
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/view-account/ylX4blBYT9FaoVd6OhvR?report=bOoeBGLXVHoGjXfjeHLFo5lFU
- aid: the-cat-api:the-cat-api-votes-api
  name: The Cat API Votes API
  description: Cast and manage votes on cat images.
  humanURL: https://thecatapi.com/
  baseURL: https://api.thecatapi.com/v1
  tags:
  - Votes
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/the-cat-api-votes-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/
  - type: Signup
    url: https://account.thecatapi.com/
  - type: GettingStarted
    url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/view-account/ylX4blBYT9FaoVd6OhvR?report=bOoeBGLXVHoGjXfjeHLFo5lFU
common:
- type: AgenticAccess
  url: agentic-access/the-cat-api-agentic-access.yml
- type: DomainSecurity
  url: security/the-cat-api-domain-security.yml
- type: Authentication
  url: authentication/the-cat-api-authentication.yml
- type: Website
  url: https://thecatapi.com/
- type: Documentation
  url: https://developers.thecatapi.com/
- type: Signup
  url: https://account.thecatapi.com/
- type: GitHubOrganization
  url: https://github.com/thatapicompany
- type: OpenAPI
  url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/the-cat-api/refs/heads/main/openapi/the-cat-api-openapi.yml
- type: Pricing
  url: https://thecatapi.com/pricing
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
  email: kin@apievangelist.com

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