Run literature reviews on one research API
A literature review means searching several databases, finding full texts and following citations. PDF Vector puts those steps behind one API, so research tools, RAG pipelines and review teams can work from the same source.
Academic Search queries PubMed, arXiv, OpenAlex, Semantic Scholar, Europe PMC, ERIC, Crossref and Google Scholar in one request. Academic Fetch and Academic Parse resolve identifiers to metadata, open-access PDFs and clean markdown, and the citation and similarity APIs help you expand from a set of seed papers.
From search query to evidence table
- 1
Search every database at once
Send one query with a year range and get ranked results with citation counts and source metadata.
Academic Search API - 2
Resolve and read full texts
Fetch metadata by DOI, PMID or arXiv ID, then turn open-access PDFs into markdown you can screen or feed to an LLM.
Academic Parse API - 3
Expand from seed papers
Walk citations and references, and find similar papers ranked by citation-network similarity.
Similar Papers API - 4
Ground your writing
Find citations for the claims in a draft, one sentence at a time, with a relevance score for each match.
Find Citations API
APIs for this workflow
- Academic Search APISearch across 8 academic databases in one request (from 2 credits/request)
- Academic Fetch APIFetch paper metadata by DOI, PMID, ArXiv ID, or other identifiers (from 2 credits/request)
- Academic Parse APIConvert paper IDs and provider URLs to markdown (from 1 credits/page)
- Academic Paper Graph APIGet a paper's citations and references as full publication objects
- Academic Similar Papers APIFind papers similar to any paper using citation network analysis (from 3 credits/request)
- Academic Find Citations APIFind relevant citations for your text using AI (from 2 credits/sentence)
- Academic Search Grants APISearch research grants across Grants.gov, NIH, CORDIS, and UKRI (from 2 credits/request)
Free tools and automation
Guides
Frequently asked questions
- Which databases does Academic Search cover?
- PubMed, arXiv, OpenAlex, Semantic Scholar, Europe PMC, ERIC, Crossref and Google Scholar, in a single request.
- Can I get the full text of papers?
- Yes, for papers with a publicly available PDF. Academic Parse finds the PDF for a DOI, PMID, arXiv ID or paper URL and converts it to markdown.
- Do I need my own Semantic Scholar or PubMed API keys?
- No. PDF Vector queries the sources for you; you only need a PDF Vector API key.
- Can I try it without code?
- Yes. The free DOI to PDF converter finds open-access PDFs without an account, and the n8n, Zapier and Make integrations run the academic APIs without code.