# Project Gutenberg

A volunteer-built library of free eBooks, mostly older works out of US copyright, offered as HTML, EPUB, Kindle and plain text, with full catalog dumps in RDF and CSV.

- Category: Books and libraries · by Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (volunteers)
- Website: https://www.gutenberg.org/
- Live data: no
- Checked on the official pages: 2026-10-23

## API

- Official API: yes, docs https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/offline_catalogs.html
- Key needed: no
- Price: Free; limits: Website is for human users only; automated access only via the harvest endpoint, mirrors, feeds and catalog files (example uses wget -w 2).
- Base URL: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/search.opds/
- Formats: xml

Example request:

```
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/search.opds/?query=dickens
```

## Data and license

- Download: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/feeds/ (rdf, xml, csv, marc, txt, epub, html)
- License: Public domain in the US (most eBooks); Project Gutenberg License / trademark terms (https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/permission.html); covers Public-domain eBook texts and catalog metadata; the 'Project Gutenberg' trademark is restricted; non-US users must check local law
- Commercial use with conditions
- No credit needed
- Can be embedded
- Quote (api_official): "OPDS is primarily intended for machine-to-machine communication for use in applications that can present or manage the lists of content. To use Project Gutenberg’s OPDS feed, start at https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/search.opds/ ." (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/offline_catalogs.html)
- Quote (api_key): "100% Free - No fees, no registration, completely free" (https://www.gutenberg.org/)
- Quote (api_future): "A JSON-based OPDS2 feed is currently available for testing. Please contact us for details and access. We expect to sunset the existing XML-based OPDS feeds in 2027." (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/offline_catalogs.html)
- Quote (limits): "The Project Gutenberg website is intended for human users only. Any perceived use of automated tools to access the Project Gutenberg website will result in a temporary or permanent block of your IP address." (https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/robot_access.html)
- Quote (download): "All Project Gutenberg metadata are available digitally in the XML/RDF format. This is updated daily" (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/offline_catalogs.html)
- Quote (catalog_license): "The catalog data are granted to the public domain." (https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/robot_access.html)
- Quote (commercial): "The vast majority of Project Gutenberg eBooks are in the public domain in the US. This means that nobody can grant, or withhold, permission to do with this item as you please. “As you please” includes any commercial use, republishing in any format, making derivative works or performances, etc." (https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/permission.html)
- Quote (trademark): "The name “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. The Small Print License guides terms of use. Basically, you need to pay royalties for commercial use (mentioned below)." (https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/permission.html)
- Quote (attribution): "It is always OK to cite Project Gutenberg as the publication source (see below for how to cite), and it is also OK to not cite Project Gutenberg: your choice." (https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/permission.html)
- Quote (embed): "To link to a specific eBook, link to the landing page for that eBook, not to specific files." (https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/permission.html)
- Quote (api_price): "100% Free - No fees, no registration, completely free" (https://www.gutenberg.org/)

## Rules for an agent

- Never crawl gutenberg.org pages; use pg_catalog.csv or the RDF dump for metadata and /robot/harvest or a mirror for files.
- Do not crawl the website; use the catalog files, harvest endpoint (wget -w 2) or a mirror.
- Link to book landing pages (/ebooks/<id>), not deep links to files.
- Public-domain texts are free to reuse, but commercial use of the 'Project Gutenberg' name/trademark needs royalties under its license; outside the US, check local copyright.

## Build ideas on AgentGid

- [Ask questions of a classic book](https://agentgid.com/resources/ideas/ask-a-classic-book/agent.md)

Human page: https://agentgid.com/resources/project-gutenberg/
Source: AgentGid (agentgid.com). Facts are quoted from the site's own pages; check the license page before you ship.