Open Disease API (disease.sh)
- Free allowance
- Free to use, with no key and no request limit stated on the home page, the docs or the README: COVID-19 and influenza statistics as JSON.
- Verdict
- caveatusable, with a named limit or an unprobed read path
- Cost
- free tier
- Identity
- anonymousno card, no phone
- Binding limit
- noneno named constraint binds
- Evidence
- documented25 sources; a first-party page was read and the sentence quoted
- Freshness
- stale on 2026-12-03checked 2026-11-02 (live); stale on 2026-12-03
| Free tier | Free to use, with no key and no request limit stated on the home page, the docs or the README: COVID-19 and influenza statistics as JSON. unit unlimited; metered on none; A burst of 120 parallel keyless GETs all answered HTTP 200. The Worldometers totals update every 10 minutes. |
|---|---|
| Price | none stated |
| Limits |
|
| Binding | none No quota, key or rate limit is stated, and a 120-request parallel burst met no 429; what a reader meets instead is a feed that has stopped updating or fails. |
| Identity | anonymous No account and no key: the home page states that no signup is required, and keyless GETs answered HTTP 200. |
| Egress | not applicable: JSON answers, not metered in bytes |
| Per-object cap | no cap stated; one GET of /v3/covid-19/historical?lastdays=all returned the whole JHU time series of every country and province in 13953048 bytes |
| Retention | the JHU time series runs from 1/22/20 to 3/9/23; the Worldometers totals are live, updated every 10 minutes |
| Interface | rest HTTPS GET at disease.sh/v3/ with JSON answers, open to all origins (Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *); the OpenAPI 3.0.0 document is at disease.sh/apidocs/swagger_v3.json and the live reference at disease.sh/docs/ endpoint: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/all |
| Tooling | any HTTP client. The last resort is self-hosted: the open-source API server, which the user installs and runs with Redis on a rented or free machine, started with docker-compose or npm. |
| Composes with | Free keyless epidemiology numbers for dashboards: live Worldometers totals by country and continent, with the JHU time series for history up to 3/9/23. Bulk path: GET /v3/covid-19/historical?lastdays=all returns the whole time series of every country and province in one JSON of 13953048 bytes; the JHU CSSE and NYT repositories that the README lists as sources are the public bulk data behind it. The last resort is self-hosted: the open-source server that the user installs and runs with Redis on a rented or free machine. |
| Reliability | On 2026-11-02 /v3/covid-19/jhucsse/counties answered HTTP 502 with Retry-After 60, and the JHU time series ends on 3/9/23; the live Worldometers totals answered 200 with JSON that carries an updated timestamp. |
| Notes | Caveat: the JHU time series ends 3/9/23 and /v3/covid-19/jhucsse/counties failed with HTTP 502 on 2026-11-02; the Worldometers totals are live. Free requests: no key, no stated limit. Bulk path: /v3/covid-19/historical?lastdays=all, one GET. |
| Evidence note | documented Free use and no sign-up are stated on the home page and in the site source; keyless GETs answered 200, one request returned the whole JHU series, and 120 parallel GETs met no 429. No rate limit is published, so the absence of one is read from that burst and not from a statement. |
| Parsed numbers |
|
Evidence 25
| date | source | what it proved |
|---|---|---|
| 2026-11-02 | disease.sh/ | the services are free to use |
| 2026-11-02 | disease.sh/ | the API covers current global outbreaks, COVID-19 and influenza |
| 2026-11-02 | disease.sh/ | the served home page's own metadata says no signup is required |
| 2026-11-02 | github.com/disease-sh/API/blob/master/public/index.ejs | the site source's page metadata says no signup is required |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/all | a keyless GET of the global totals answered HTTP 200 |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/all | the answer allows cross-origin reads from any origin |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/all | the body is JSON with an updated timestamp and the global totals |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/all | the burst was 120 parallel GETs |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/all | the highest status of the 120 runs was 200, so none answered 429 |
| 2026-11-02 | disease.sh/docs/ | the Worldometers COVID-19 totals update every 10 minutes |
| 2026-11-02 | disease.sh/docs/ | the JHUCSSE group, which holds the historical endpoints, is sourced from Johns Hopkins University |
| 2026-11-02 | disease.sh/docs/ | the /v3/covid-19/historical endpoint returns the time series of all countries and their provinces |
| 2026-11-02 | disease.sh/apidocs/swagger_v3.json | the lastdays parameter takes all for the full data set |
| 2026-11-02 | disease.sh/apidocs/swagger_v3.json | the contract is an OpenAPI 3.0.0 document |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/historical?lastdays=all | one GET with lastdays=all answered 200 with 13953048 bytes |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/historical/all?lastdays=all | the global series starts on 1/22/20 |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/historical/all?lastdays=all | the global series ends on 3/9/23 |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/jhucsse/counties | the JHU counties endpoint answered HTTP 502 |
| 2026-11-02 | probe: https://disease.sh/v3/covid-19/jhucsse/counties | that answer carried Retry-After 60 |
| 2026-11-02 | raw.githubusercontent.com/disease-sh/API/master/README.md | the open-source server needs a Redis server started with redis-server |
| 2026-11-02 | raw.githubusercontent.com/disease-sh/API/master/README.md | the README has a docker-compose install path for the open-source server |
| 2026-11-02 | raw.githubusercontent.com/disease-sh/API/master/README.md | the open-source server also runs with docker-compose |
| 2026-11-02 | raw.githubusercontent.com/disease-sh/API/master/README.md | the README lists the JHU CSSE time series repository as a source |
| 2026-11-02 | raw.githubusercontent.com/disease-sh/API/master/README.md | the README lists the NYT COVID-19 data repository as a source |
| 2026-11-02 | raw.githubusercontent.com/disease-sh/API/master/server.js | the server source sets CORS open to every origin |