Authentication Fresh

DataForSEO uses HTTP Basic Authentication. Your API credentials are distinct from your account password. Find them in the API Access tab of your dashboard after creating a free account.

How It Works

Your login and password are concatenated with a colon, Base64-encoded, and sent in the Authorization header on every request:

Authorization: Basic <base64(login:password)>

For example, if your login is login and password is password, the Base64-encoded value is:

bG9naW46cGFzc3dvcmQ=

So the full header looks like:

Authorization: Basic bG9naW46cGFzc3dvcmQ=

Important rules:

• Credentials cannot be passed in URL parameters
• There is no separate login endpoint — include auth on every request
• The API password is auto-generated by DataForSEO, not the same as your dashboard password

Code Examples

curl

login="your_login"
password="your_password"
cred="$(printf ${login}:${password} | base64)"

curl --location --request POST "https://api.dataforseo.com/v3/serp/google/organic/live/advanced" \
  --header "Authorization: Basic ${cred}" \
  --header "Content-Type: application/json" \
  --data '[{"keyword":"seo tools","location_code":2840,"language_code":"en"}]'

Python

import requests
from requests.auth import HTTPBasicAuth
import json

login = "your_login"
password = "your_password"

url = "https://api.dataforseo.com/v3/serp/google/organic/live/advanced"
payload = [{"keyword": "seo tools", "location_code": 2840, "language_code": "en"}]

response = requests.post(
    url,
    auth=HTTPBasicAuth(login, password),
    json=payload
)

print(json.dumps(response.json(), indent=2))

JavaScript (Node.js / axios)

const axios = require('axios');

const login = 'your_login';
const password = 'your_password';

axios({
    method: 'post',
    url: 'https://api.dataforseo.com/v3/serp/google/organic/live/advanced',
    auth: {
        username: login,
        password: password
    },
    data: [
        {
            keyword: 'seo tools',
            location_code: 2840,
            language_code: 'en'
        }
    ]
}).then(response => {
    console.log(JSON.stringify(response.data, null, 2));
}).catch(error => {
    console.error(error.response?.data || error.message);
});

PHP

<?php
require('RestClient.php');
// Download RestClient from the DataForSEO PHP examples package

try {
    $client = new RestClient('https://api.dataforseo.com/', null, 'your_login', 'your_password');

    $post_array = [];
    $post_array[] = [
        'keyword'       => 'seo tools',
        'location_code' => 2840,
        'language_code' => 'en'
    ];

    $result = $client->post('/v3/serp/google/organic/live/advanced', $post_array);
    print_r($result);

} catch (RestClientException $e) {
    echo "HTTP code: {$e->getHttpCode()}\n";
    echo "Error code: {$e->getCode()}\n";
    echo "Message: {$e->getMessage()}\n";
}
?>

Authentication Errors

HTTP Status	Code	Meaning
401	—	Invalid or missing credentials
403	—	Account suspended or access denied
40101	Internal	Login or password incorrect

If you receive a 401, check:

1. You are using the API password (from the API Access tab), not your dashboard password
2. The Base64 encoding is correct — whitespace or newlines will break it
3. The Authorization header is present on the request, not passed as a query parameter

Testing Your Credentials

A quick way to validate credentials is to call the user data endpoint:

curl --location "https://api.dataforseo.com/v3/appendix/user_data" \
  --header "Authorization: Basic $(printf 'your_login:your_password' | base64)"

A successful response returns your account balance and usage details.