ItemLookup

Given an Item identifier, the ItemLookup operation returns some or all of the item attributes, depending on the response group specified in the request. By default, ItemLookup returns an item’s ASIN, DetailPageURL, Manufacturer, ProductGroup, and Title of the item.

ItemLookup supports many response groups, so you can retrieve many different kinds of product information, called item attributes, including product reviews, variations, similar products, pricing, availability, images of products, accessories, and other information.

To look up more than one item at a time, separate the item identifiers by commas.

All locales, however, the parameter support varies by locale.

The following table describes the request parameters for ItemLookup. Parameter names are case sensitive.

ParameterDefinitionRequired
Condition

Specifies an item's condition. If Condition is set to “All,” a separate set of responses is returned for each valid value of Condition. The default value is "New" (not "All"). So, if your request does not return results, consider setting the value to "All." When the value is "New," the ItemSearch Availability parameter cannot be set to "Available." Amazon only sells items that are "New."

Default: New

Valid Values: Used | Collectible | Refurbished, All

No
Idtype

Type of item identifier used to look up an item. All IdTypes except ASINx require a SearchIndex to be specified. SKU requires a MerchantId to be specified also. For more information, see Item Identifiers.

Default: ASIN

Valid Values: SKU | UPC | EAN | ISBN (US only, when search index is Books) | JAN. UPC is not valid in the CA locale.

No
ItemId

A positive integer that unique identifies an item. The meaning of the number is specified by IdType. That is, if IdType is ASIN, the ItemId value is an ASIN. If ItemIdis an ASIN, a search index cannot be specified in the request.

Default: None

Valid Values: Valid item ID.

Yes
MerchantId

Specifies the merchant who is offering the item. MerchantId is an alphanumeric identifier assigned by Amazon to merchants. Note that the default value is "Amazon." If your request does not generate results, consider setting the value to "All."

Make sure to use a Merchant ID and not a Seller ID, which is not supported.

Default: Amazon

Valid Values: MerchantId--ID of a merchant | All--Includes Amazon and all other merchants | Featured--Merchants listed when you click “Add to Cart”

Depends
OfferPage

Page of offers returned by ItemLookup. There are 10 offers per page. To examine offers 11 trough 20, for example, set OfferPage to 2.

Default: 1

Valid Values; Integer between 1 and 100, inclusive

No
RelatedItemsPage This optional parameter is only valid when the RelatedItems response group is used. Each ItemLookup request can return, at most, ten related items. The RelatedItemsPage value specifies the set of ten related items to return. A value of 2, for example, returns the second set of ten related items No
RelationshipType This parameter is required when the RelatedItems response group is used. The type of related item returned is specified by the RelationshipType parameter. Sample values include Episode, Season, and Tracks. A complete list of values follows this table.Yes when RelatedItems response group is used
ReviewPage

Page of reviews returned by ItemLookup. There are 5 reviews per page. To examine reviews 6 through 10, for example, set ReviewPage to 2.

Default: 1

Valid Values; Integer between 1 and 20, inclusive

No
ReviewSort

Specifies the order in which Reviews are sorted in the return. For more information, see Sorting Reviews

Default: -SubmissionDate

Valid Values: -HelpfulVotes | HelpfulVotes | -OverallRating | OverallRating | SubmissionDate

No
SearchIndex

The product category to search.

Default: None

Valid Values: A search index, for example, Apparel, Beauty, Blended, Books, and so forth. For a complete of search indices, see Search Indices.

Constraint:If ItemIdis an ASIN, a search index cannot be specified in the request.

Yes, for non-ASIN ItemIds
TagPage

Specifies the page of results to return. There are ten results on a page.

Type: Integer

Default: None

Constraint: The maximum page number is 400.

No
TagsPerPage

The number of tags to return that are associated with a specified item.

Type: Integer

Default: None

No
TagSort

Specifies the sorting order for the results.

Default: - Usages

Valid Values:

  • FirstUsed-Sort by the date the item was first used.

    - FirstUsed

  • LastUsed-Sort by the date the item was last used.

    - LastUsed

  • Name-Alphabetical, A-Z.

    - Name

  • Usages-Items least used to most used

To sort items in descending order, prefix the values with a negative sign (-).

No
VariationPage

Page number of variations returned by ItemLookup. By default, ItemLookup returns all variations. Use VariationPage to return a subsection of the response. There are 10 variations per page. To examine offers 11 trough 20, for example, set VariationPage to 2.

Default: All

Valid Values: Integer between 1 and 150, inclusive

No
ResponseGroup

Specifies the types of values to return. You can specify multiple response groups in one request by separating them with commas.

Valid Values: Accessories | BrowseNodes | EditorialReview | Images | ItemAttributes | ItemIds | Large | ListmaniaLists | Medium | MerchantItemAttributes | OfferFull | Offers | PromotionDetails | PromotionSummary | OfferSummary RelatedItems | Reviews | SalesRank | Similarities | Subjects | Tags | TagsSummary | Tracks | VariationImages | VariationMinimum | Variations (US only) | VariationSummary

No

ItemLookup also accepts the parameters that all operations can use. For more information, see, Common Request Parameters

When an ItemLookup request uses the RelatedItems response group, the RelationshipType parameter is required. This parameter specifies the means by which items are related to the one specified in the ItemLookup request (by the ItemId parameter). The following list specifies all of the valid values for RelationshipType:

The following table describes the default response tags included in ItemLookup responses.

Element TagDefinition
ASIN Amazon Standard Identification Number, which is an alphanumeric token assigned by Amazon to an item that uniquely identifies it.
Item Container for information about the item, including DetailPageURL, ASIN, Title, ProductGroup. and Manufacturer.
ItemAttributes Container for information about an item, including Title, ProductGroup. and Manufacturer.
Items Container for one or more Item(s).
Manufacturer Name of the company that manufactured the item.
ProductGroup Category of the item, for example, “Book,” “DVD.” You can find the complete list of product groups by going to www.amazon.com and clicking the tab that says "See All 32 Product Categories."
Title Title of the item.

For more information about the parent elements of these tags, see the appropriate response group in Response Groups

Use ItemLookup in the following ways:

  • The following request returns the information associated with ItemId B00008OE6I.

    http://ecs.amazonaws.com/onca/xml?
    Service=AWSECommerceService&
    AWSAccessKeyId=[AWS Access Key ID]&
    Operation=ItemLookup&
    ItemId=B00008OE6I    

    The response to this request is shown in, Response to Sample Request.

  • The following request returns an offer for a refurbished item that is not sold by Amazon.

    http://ecs.amazonaws.com/onca/xml?
    Service=AWSECommerceService&
    AWSAccessKeyId=[AWS Access Key ID]&
    Operation=ItemLookup&
    ItemId=B00008OE6I&
    IdType=ASIN&
    ItemId=B00023NDLS&
    ResponseGroup=OfferFull&
    Condition=All&
    MerchantId=All    

    In this example, because the item is not sold by Amazon, the following values must be set: Condition=All and MerchantId=All or the ID of a specific merchant.

  • In the following request, the ItemId is an SKU, which requires that you also specify the MerchantId and IdType. A MerchantId value is required because the default value is "Amazon," and items for sale by Amazon are never identified by an SKU value.

    http://ecs.amazonaws.com/onca/xml?
    Service=AWSECommerceService&
    AWSAccessKeyId=[AWS Access Key ID]&
    Operation=ItemLookup&
    ItemId=[SKU]&
    MerchantId=[MerchantID]&
    IdType=SKU
  • In the following request, the ItemId is a UPC, which requires that you also specify the SearchIndex and ItemType.

    http://ecs.amazonaws.com/onca/xml?
    Service=AWSECommerceService&
    AWSAccessKeyId=[AWS Access Key ID]&
    Operation=ItemLookup&
    ItemId=[UPC]&
    SearchIndex=Books&
    &IdType=UPC
  • In the following request, the ItemId is an EAN, which requires that you also specify the SearchIndex and ItemType.

    http://ecs.amazonaws.com/onca/xml?
    Service=AWSECommerceService&
    AWSAccessKeyId=[AWS Access Key ID]&
    Operation=ItemLookup&
    ItemId=[EAN]&
    SearchIndex=Electronics&
    IdType=EAN
  • Use the BrowseNodes response group to find the browse node of an item.

  • Use the Tracks response group to find the track, title, and number for each track on each CD in the response.

  • Use the Similarities response group to find the ASIN and Title for similar products returned in the response.

  • Use the Reviews response group to find reviews written by customers about an item, and the total number of reviews for each item in the response.

  • Use the OfferSummary response group to find the number of offer listings and the lowest price for each of the offer listing condition classes, including New, Used, Collectible, and Refurbished.

  • Use the Accessories response group to find the a list of accessory product ASINs and Titles for each product in the response that has accessories.

The following code snippet is a response to the first request. It shows all of the item attributes that are returned by default.

<Items>
  <Request>
  <IsValid>True</IsValid> 
  <ItemLookupRequest>
    <ItemId>B00008OE6I</ItemId> 
  </ItemLookupRequest>
  </Request>
  <Item>
    <ASIN>B00008OE6I</ASIN> 
<DetailPageURL>http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect?tag=ws%26link_code=xm2%26camp=2025%26creative=165953%26path=http://www.amazon.com/gp/redirect.html%253fASIN=B00008OE6I%2526tag=ws%2526lcode=xm2%2526cID=2025%2526ccmID=165953%2526location=/o/ASIN/B00008OE6I%25253FAWSAccessKeyId=[AWS Access Key ID]</DetailPageURL> 
    <ItemAttributes>
    <Manufacturer>Canon</Manufacturer> 
    <ProductGroup>Photography</ProductGroup> 
    <Title>Canon PowerShot S400 4MP Digital Camera w/ 3x Optical Zoom</Title> 
   </ItemAttributes>
  </Item>
</Items>