Free Metals Price API with no card and no trial clock

Live gold, silver, platinum, palladium and copper prices as JSON. The free tier allows 200 requests a month, roughly 7 a day, and it never turns into a trial.

Get a free key See the full API

The free plan

200 requests a month

Price: $0, no card, no expiry
Per month: 200 weight for the account (200 spot calls)
Per minute: 10 weight for the key
API keys: 1
Data: Live spot for ten metals, currency conversion, market status, instruments
Credit link: Required wherever the prices appear publicly

What you get

What the free tier includes, and what it doesn't

Free is live prices only by design. Those are served from cache and cost almost nothing, which is why the allowance is generous. History and exchange data are expensive to collect and keep correct, so they sit behind a plan.

Included free

Live spot prices for gold, silver, platinum, palladium and copper
Aluminium, nickel, zinc, lead and tin
24-hour change, high and low on every quote, with an indicative bid and ask
Currency conversion across major pairs
Market status, so you know whether a venue is open
The full instrument catalogue, 1,100 plus symbols

Needs a paid plan

Historical prices and candles, which start on Starter ($9 a month)
News, crypto, ETFs and indices
COMEX, LBMA, Shanghai and India exchange data
CFTC positioning, funding rates and bullion dealer premiums

Quickstart

Your first request

Replace mc_live_YOUR_KEY with the key from your API console. There's no SDK to install.

Gold price API in cURL

curl -H "Authorization: Bearer mc_live_YOUR_KEY" \
  "https://api.metalcharts.org/v1/prices"

Every tracked metal comes back in one response; gold is under data.XAU.

Gold price API in Python

import requests

res = requests.get(
    "https://api.metalcharts.org/v1/prices",
    headers={"Authorization": "Bearer mc_live_YOUR_KEY"},
    timeout=10,
)
res.raise_for_status()

price = res.json()["data"]["XAU"]["price"]
print(f"Gold: ${price}")

Uses requests. raise_for_status turns a 401 or 429 into an exception rather than letting a bad payload through.

Gold price API in JavaScript

const res = await fetch(
  "https://api.metalcharts.org/v1/prices",
  { headers: { Authorization: "Bearer mc_live_YOUR_KEY" } },
);

if (!res.ok) throw new Error(`HTTP ${res.status}`);

const { data } = await res.json();
console.log(`Gold: ${data.XAU.price}`);

Native fetch, so it runs in Node 18 and above. Keep the key on your server; proxy browser requests through it.

Gold price API in PHP

<?php
$ch = curl_init("https://api.metalcharts.org/v1/prices");
curl_setopt_array($ch, [
    CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER => true,
    CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER => ["Authorization: Bearer mc_live_YOUR_KEY"],
    CURLOPT_TIMEOUT => 10,
]);

$body = curl_exec($ch);
$code = curl_getinfo($ch, CURLINFO_HTTP_CODE);
curl_close($ch);

if ($code !== 200) {
    throw new RuntimeException("MetalCharts API returned $code");
}

$data = json_decode($body, true);
echo "Gold: " . $data["data"]["XAU"]["price"];

Plain cURL with no dependencies. Check the status code, because a failed call still returns a parseable body.

Gold price API in Go

req, _ := http.NewRequest(
    http.MethodGet, "https://api.metalcharts.org/v1/prices", nil,
)
req.Header.Set("Authorization", "Bearer mc_live_YOUR_KEY")

resp, err := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)
if err != nil {
    return err
}
defer resp.Body.Close()

var out struct {
    Data map[string]struct {
        Price float64 `json:"price"`
    } `json:"data"`
}
if err := json.NewDecoder(resp.Body).Decode(&out); err != nil {
    return err
}
fmt.Println("Gold:", out.Data["XAU"].Price)

Decoding into a narrow struct keeps the compiler honest about the field you actually use.

Limits

Exactly how the free limits work

Two limits apply: 200 weight a month across the account, and 10 weight a minute on the key. A spot call costs 1 weight. Here is precisely how they are counted.

01
What a request costs
Every call costs weight. Spot prices, market status, instruments and most other endpoints cost 1. History and news cost 2. News search and sentiment cost 3. Checking your own usage at /v1/usage costs 0. Both limits are counted in weight, so a 10,000 allowance is 10,000 spot calls or 5,000 history calls.
02
The per-minute limit is per key
Each API key has its own per-minute limit, counted in fixed one-minute windows that reset at the start of every minute (UTC). Go over it and that key gets a 429 with a Retry-After header giving the seconds until the next minute. Your other keys are unaffected.
03
The monthly allowance is per account
On plans that have one, the monthly allowance is shared by all of your keys and counted per calendar month in UTC. It resets at 00:00 UTC on the 1st. Go over it and every request returns a 429 saying the monthly quota is exceeded, until the reset or until you upgrade.
04
What counts and what doesn't
Every request with a valid key for data your plan includes counts toward both limits, including requests refused with a 429. A request with a missing or invalid key (401), or for data your plan doesn't include (403), counts toward neither.
05
No surprise bills
Going over a limit never charges you and never upgrades your plan. You upgrade or downgrade yourself from the API console, and the new limits apply to your keys within 20 seconds.
06
Every response tells you where you stand
Responses carry X-RateLimit-Limit, X-RateLimit-Remaining, X-RateLimit-Used and X-RateLimit-Reset for the current minute. On plans with a monthly allowance they also carry X-RateLimit-Month-Limit, X-RateLimit-Month-Remaining, X-RateLimit-Month-Used and X-RateLimit-Month-Reset.

When you outgrow it

Every plan, side by side

Starter is the next step: 10,000 requests a month, 20 a minute per key and a year of history for $9 a month.

Compare all plans

Rate limits, monthly allowances, API keys and history depth for each MetalCharts API plan
Plan	Per minuteweight, per API key	Per monthweight, all keys combined	API keys	History
Free$0	10	200200 spot calls	1	Live spot only
Starter$9/mo	20	10,00010,000 spot calls or 5,000 history calls	2	1 year
Basic$29/mo	30	250,000250,000 spot calls or 125,000 history calls	3	1 year
Pro$99/mo	200	No monthly cap	10	5 years
Ultimate$249/mo	1,000	No monthly cap	25	Full, back to 1966

The one condition

Show a credit link where the prices are public

Wherever free-tier prices appear publicly, on a website, in an app or in a post, show a visible link to metalcharts.org next to them. Internal tools and paid plans don't need it. The snippet is also in your API console.

HTML

<a href="https://metalcharts.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Metal prices by MetalCharts</a>

FAQ

Free API questions

Is the metals API really free?

Yes, and it does not expire. The free tier gives live spot prices for every metal we track, currency conversion and market status, with one API key and 200 weight a month. You need an account but not a credit card, and there is no trial clock.

How many requests does the free tier allow?

200 weight a month for the account and 10 weight a minute for the key. Spot price calls cost 1 weight each, so that is 200 price requests a month, or roughly 7 a day. That is enough to try the API and run occasional checks. Anything that polls on a schedule needs a paid plan: checking once an hour is about 720 requests a month, which Starter covers with 10,000 a month for $9.

What happens when I reach 200 requests?

Every further request returns a 429 saying the monthly quota is exceeded, until 00:00 UTC on the 1st of next month, when the allowance resets. Nothing is charged and the plan doesn't upgrade itself. Requests over the 10-a-minute limit get a 429 with a Retry-After header instead, and those still count toward the month.

What is not included in the free tier?

Historical data, news, crypto, ETFs and indices all need a paid plan, as does exchange data such as COMEX inventory and CFTC positioning. Free covers live prices only, because that is the part that costs us almost nothing to serve from cache.

Do I need a credit card for the free tier?

No. Create an account, open the API console and generate a key. Nothing asks for payment details unless you choose a paid plan.

How does this compare to other free metals APIs?

Metals.Dev and MetalpriceAPI each list 100 free requests a month on their pricing pages, and MetalpriceAPI's free plan updates daily. This one allows 200, covers ten metals and includes currency conversion. Quotes also carry an indicative bid and ask, a fixed spread around the mid price.

Can I use the free tier commercially?

Yes, with a credit link. Commercial use is permitted on every plan, the free tier included, and there is no separate commercial licence to buy. Wherever free-tier prices appear publicly, show a visible link to metalcharts.org, such as "Metal prices by MetalCharts". Paid plans don't need the link. On every plan, you may not resell access to the API or republish the raw data as a competing feed.

Guides

Per-metal guides

Get your free key

200 requests a month, no card, no expiry. Takes about a minute.

Get a free key See pricing