Snapshot

The snapshot is the complete OpenAlex database as downloadable files. It’s stored in Amazon S3 in the openalex bucket, under the data/ prefix — free to download, no AWS account needed (see Access & authentication below). For step-by-step download commands, see the download recipe.

Two formats

The snapshot is published in two formats, each a complete copy of the same data:

Size

Check the current size before downloading — it grows over time. As of the June 2026 release, each format holds about 649 million records:

Decompressed, the JSON Lines data runs to several terabytes. The two formats are separate complete copies, so downloading both roughly doubles the transfer — most users want a single format prefix. Live totals are always in each format’s manifest.json (content_length, per entity and overall).

Bucket structure

Under each format prefix there is one folder per entity type, plus a combined manifest.json:

s3://openalex/data/
├── jsonl/
│   ├── manifest.json          # all entities, this format
│   ├── works/
│   │   ├── manifest.json       # works only
│   │   └── updated_date=2026-06-24/
│   │       ├── part_0000.gz
│   │       └── part_0001.gz
│   ├── authors/
│   └── ...
└── parquet/
    ├── manifest.json
    ├── works/
    │   ├── manifest.json
    │   └── updated_date=2026-06-24/
    │       ├── part_0000.parquet
    │       └── part_0001.parquet
    └── ...

The entity folders under each format are:

You can browse the bucket at openalex.s3.amazonaws.com/browse.html.

Records are partitioned by updated_date: each partition holds the records that last changed on that date, in part files (part_0000.*, part_0001.*, …) of up to 400,000 records each. This is what makes incremental updates cheap — see Sync for how partitions move between releases and how to keep a copy current.

Note: Pre-2026 snapshots used a flat data/{entity}/ layout (JSON Lines only) with no jsonl//parquet/ split. That older layout, along with the merged_ids/ directory, is preserved under the legacy-data/ prefix.

The manifest files

Every format has a combined manifest.json listing all data files across all entities (/data/{format}/manifest.json), and every entity has its own (/data/{format}/{entity}/manifest.json). The manifest is written last, after all data files are uploaded — if the manifest is present, the data for that format is complete.

A per-entity manifest looks like this:

{
  "date": "2026-06-25",
  "format": "jsonl",
  "entity": "works",
  "record_count": 510372821,
  "content_length": 665688383258,
  "files": [
    {
      "url": "s3://openalex/data/jsonl/works/updated_date=2026-06-24/part_0000.gz",
      "meta": { "content_length": 936733, "record_count": 499 }
    }
  ]
}

The combined manifest has the same shape but nests one entry per entity under an entities array, with a top-level meta carrying the totals. The manifest drives the incremental-update workflow.

Entity schemas

Each record is a complete entity object in the same shape the API returns — the field dictionaries on the Entities tab apply directly:

• Works · Authors · Sources · Institutions · Topics · Publishers

How the snapshot differs from the API

People often compare counts or fields between their snapshot copy and the live API and worry when they differ. The known, expected differences:

Otherwise the snapshot work schema matches the API’s — including fwci, topics, citation_normalized_percentile, and is_xpac.

Access & authentication

Bulk data lives in several buckets with different access rules. This is the map:

The public snapshot bucket: free, no account

The openalex bucket is free to download and needs no AWS account. Use the AWS CLI with --no-sign-request for anonymous access:

aws s3 sync "s3://openalex/data/jsonl" "openalex-snapshot/data/jsonl" --no-sign-request

You can also browse it in a browser: openalex.s3.amazonaws.com/browse.html. Many thanks to the AWS Open Data program, which covers the data-transfer fees (about $70 per download) so users don’t have to.

The daily snapshot bucket (paid plans)

Subscribers get a full snapshot rebuilt every day, published to dated folders in the openalex-snapshots staging bucket in both formats. Access is via your OpenAlex API key, exchanged automatically for temporary AWS credentials.

Add this to ~/.aws/config (replace YOUR_KEY with your API key):

[profile openalex]
credential_process = curl -sf -X POST "https://api.openalex.org/snapshots/credentials?api_key=YOUR_KEY"

The AWS CLI fetches and refreshes credentials automatically. Then:

aws s3 ls s3://openalex-snapshots/full/ --profile openalex
aws s3 sync s3://openalex-snapshots/full/2026-04-29/jsonl/ ./openalex-snapshot-jsonl --profile openalex

See Sync for what the daily snapshot is and the sync workflows it enables.

Content archive

Per-file downloads use your API key directly ($0.01/file): https://content.openalex.org/works/W2741809807.pdf?api_key=YOUR_KEY. For full-archive sync we issue read-only Cloudflare R2 credentials — 30-day access for a one-time download, persistent access with an enterprise subscription. Details on the content archive page.

Where’s my API key?

Sign up free at openalex.org and find your key in Settings → API key. See API authentication for how keys, credits, and plans work.

Common access problems

Still stuck? Contact support with the exact command and error.

Related pages

• Sync — release cadence, partition semantics, deletions & merged entities
• Download to your machine — step-by-step recipe