# API quickstart

> Create a Ranqo API key, check it with your first request, find your brand's id and read its visibility over the last 30 days.

Source: https://ranqo.ai/docs/api/quickstart

This takes about five minutes. You need to be the account owner, on Pro or above.

### 1. Create a key

Open [Settings](https://app.ranqo.ai/settings) and find **API keys**. Press **Create key** and fill in:

- **Name**: something you will recognise later, such as the tool that uses it.
- **Brands**: every brand, including ones added later, or only the ones you tick.
- **Expires**: 30, 90, and 365 days, or never.

The key is shown once. Copy it, tick **I've saved this key somewhere safe** and press **Done**. Ranqo keeps only a fingerprint of the key and cannot show it again.

### 2. Keep it out of your code

Store the key where your tool reads secrets, not in source control. The examples below read it from an environment variable:

```bash
export RANQO_API_KEY="paste-your-key-here"
```

### 3. Make your first request

Ask for the account the key belongs to. A working key answers with your plan, its rate limit and the key's own details:

```bash title="curl"
curl https://api.ranqo.ai/v1/account \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $RANQO_API_KEY"
```

```python title="Python"
import os, requests

response = requests.get(
    "https://api.ranqo.ai/v1/account",
    headers={"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['RANQO_API_KEY']}"},
)
print(response.json())
```

```js title="JavaScript"
const response = await fetch("https://api.ranqo.ai/v1/account", {
  headers: { Authorization: `Bearer ${process.env.RANQO_API_KEY}` },
});
console.log(await response.json());
```

### 4. Find your brand's id

List the brands the key can read. Each one carries its `id`, which every brand endpoint takes in its path:

```bash title="curl"
curl https://api.ranqo.ai/v1/brands \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $RANQO_API_KEY"
```

### 5. Read its visibility

Ask for the last 30 days, with day boundaries in your own time zone:

```bash title="curl"
curl "https://api.ranqo.ai/v1/brands/BRAND_ID/visibility?period=30d&tz=Europe/Berlin" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $RANQO_API_KEY"
```

The answer holds visibility, share of voice, average position and sentiment, each as its `current` value, its `previous` value over the window before and the `change` between them. A value is `null` when there was nothing to measure, never a made-up zero.

## Next

  - [Authentication](https://ranqo.ai/docs/api/authentication): Brand access, expiry, revoking a key.
  - [Pagination](https://ranqo.ai/docs/api/pagination): Reading a list past its first page.
  - [Rate limits](https://ranqo.ai/docs/api/rate-limits): How many requests a key may make, and what to do at the limit.