/search

GET 1 request = 1 credit, regardless of result count

Coverage 127,000+ enriched companies at launch — active businesses with a verified website, classified facets and financials. Expanding towards the full register.

Searches the company index by free text and structured filters at the same time. Free text runs across the business description, offerings and target customers, so "careers guidance software for schools" matches a company whose own site says "destinations platform for students and teachers" — without either sharing a keyword.

Input

Parameter	Description	Required
`key`	Your API key. May also be sent as a bearer token or X-API-Key header.	Required
`q`	Free-text query, matched across short_desc, offerings, ideal_customers and confirmed_customers.	One required
`filter`	Structured filter expression, e.g. org_kind:=product_vendor && customer_segments:=schools_k12 && is_active:true. One of q or filter is required.	One required
`sector`	Restrict to one or more normalised sector labels.	Optional
`locality`	Exact town match via the filter parameter, e.g. filter=locality:=Bristol. Region and postcode-radius filtering ship in a later release.	Optional
`turnover_min`	Minimum latest filed turnover, in GBP.	Optional
`turnover_max`	Maximum latest filed turnover, in GBP.	Optional
`employees_min`	Minimum latest filed employee count.	Optional
`incorporated_after`	Only companies incorporated on or after this date.	Optional
`sort`	relevance, turnover_desc, employees_desc, incorporated_desc or turnover_cagr_3y_desc. Default relevance.	Optional
`limit`	Results per page. Default 20, maximum 100.	Optional
`page`	Page number, starting at 1.	Optional

Example request

GET request

https://api.ukdatalayer.com/v1/search?key=YOUR_KEY&q=careers%20guidance%20software&filter=org_kind:%3Dproduct_vendor%20%26%26%20customer_segments:%3Dschools_k12&limit=20

Output

Field	Type	Description
`results[].company_id`	string	Company ID, usable directly with /company.
`results[].company_name`	string	Registered legal name.
`results[].short_desc`	string	One-line business description.
`results[].org_kind`	string	Organisation type.
`results[].sector`	string	Normalised sector.
`results[].customer_segments`	string[]	Normalised customer segments.
`results[].delivery`	string[]	How the company delivers: saas_platform, services_consultancy, physical_products…
`results[].locality`	string \| null	Town or district of the registered office.
`results[].incorporated_year`	number \| null	Year of incorporation.
`results[].turnover`	number \| null	Latest filed turnover where disclosed.
`results[].employees`	number \| null	Latest filed employee count.
`results[].websites`	string[]	Verified domains for the company.
`found`	number	Total number of matching companies.
`page`	number	Current page number.

Example response

200 OK · application/json

{
  "status": "success",
  "credits_used": 1,
  "data": {
    "found": 342,
    "page": 1,
    "results": [
      {
        "company_id": "UK-00000042",
        "company_number": "00000042",
        "company_name": "NORTHGATE ANALYTICS LTD",
        "short_desc": "Revenue forecasting platform for subscription businesses.",
        "org_kind": "product_vendor",
        "sector": "Finance Software",
        "customer_segments": ["smb", "enterprise"],
        "delivery": ["saas_platform", "api_data"],
        "locality": "Bristol",
        "turnover": 4120000,
        "employees": 42,
        "incorporated_year": 2016,
        "websites": ["northgateanalytics.example"]
      }
    ]
  }
}

Notes

Queries are hybrid: keyword and semantic matching run together, so "careers guidance software" also finds a "destinations platform for students" that shares no keyword with the query.
Filtering on turnover excludes companies that have not disclosed one, rather than treating them as zero.
A company with several domains is indexed once, with the facets of all its domains merged.