Work types

A work type classifies the form of a scholarly document: a journal article, a preprint, a dataset, a book, and so on. Every work has exactly one type, exposed as its type field, and the type is one value from the controlled vocabulary below. Because the boundary between (say) an article and a dataset is already crisp in the real world, work types are a vocabulary entity: OpenAlex doesn’t adjudicate what a work is, it just standardizes the label so you can filter and group by it reliably. Work types use short, human-readable IDs (article, dataset) rather than the minted W/A/S scheme; a type’s full ID looks like https://openalex.org/types/article.

How we build it

The vocabulary derives from Crossref’s work types, extended with a handful of OpenAlex additions (e.g. preprint, dataset, libguides, and the newer data/software/conference splits). Every upstream source — Crossref’s type, DataCite’s resourceType, PubMed’s publication type, HAL, and others — uses its own taxonomy, so OpenAlex maps all of them onto the single vocabulary below, then applies internal heuristics (for example, titles like “Index” or “Cover Picture” become paratext). We don’t decide the boundary between types; we standardize the label. Approved curations can override the assigned type for an individual work. Full detail on assignment and the paratext category is in Work types.

Values

The complete controlled vocabulary (live from api.openalex.org/work-types). The display_name for each type is identical to its ID.

ID	Definition
`article`	Original, citable research usually in a journal, including full research papers, brief communications, technical notes, and full-paper case reports.
`book`	A scholarly book published as a complete, standalone volume, such as a monograph or authored or edited volume.
`book-chapter`	A single chapter or section within a book, such as a contributed chapter in an edited volume, sometimes presenting original research.
`book-review`	An evaluation of one book and its significance, such as a book review or a review essay focused on a single book, usually published in a journal’s book-review section.
`conference-abstract`	A standalone abstract for a conference or symposium presentation, published without the accompanying full paper, such as a meeting abstract, poster abstract, or abstract-only proceedings record.
`conference-paper`	A complete paper delivered at a conference, symposium, or meeting and usually appearing in the published proceedings, including proceedings papers and review talks given at a conference.
`data-paper`	A peer-reviewed paper written mainly to describe a dataset, such as a data descriptor or data article, rather than to analyze it.
`dataset`	The deposited data artifact itself, such as a dataset, data collection, or database record, typically with its own DOI, not a paper about the data.
`dissertation`	A document submitted in completion of an academic degree or professional qualification, such as a PhD or master’s thesis or dissertation.
`editorial`	A piece expressing the views of an individual, group, or organization on a broad topic rather than on one specific work, such as an editorial, commentary, interview, or research highlight.
`erratum`	A journal-issued fix for mistakes in a published article, such as an erratum, corrigendum, or publisher correction, referencing the article it corrects.
`letter`	A short message sent by readers to a journal’s editor responding to previously published material, such as a letter to the editor, reply, or reader comment.
`libguides`	A library research guide (LibGuides) curated by librarians to point users toward resources on a topic or course.
`other`	A catch-all for works that fit no other type, such as news items, obituaries, full journal issues, and non-scholarly repository media (photographs, video, audio).
`paratext`	Records that package or frame a publication rather than carry its content, such as covers, title pages, tables of contents, and author guidelines.
`peer-review`	A peer review or report about a single other work, rather than a survey of many, such as an open peer review, referee report, or reviewer report.
`preprint`	An article whose primary location is a preprint repository such as arXiv, bioRxiv, medRxiv, SSRN, or Research Square.
`reference-entry`	A self-contained entry within a reference work, such as an encyclopedia article, dictionary entry, or handbook entry.
`report`	A technical report or working paper issued outside the journal system by an institution, agency, or company, such as a technical report, white paper, or government report.
`retraction`	A notice that formally withdraws an earlier work and explains why, with a reference to the work being retracted.
`review`	A journal article that summarizes and evaluates the existing research on a topic without reporting new findings, such as a literature review, systematic review, or meta-analysis.
`software`	A research software package or code released as a citable artifact, such as deposited code or a tagged software release with its own identifier, not a paper about it.
`software-paper`	A peer-reviewed paper written mainly to describe research software, such as a software article or descriptor, rather than to report research results.
`standard`	A formal standard or technical specification from a Standards Development Organization (SDO) or consortium, such as an ISO, IEEE, or W3C standard.
`supplementary-materials`	Supporting materials accompanying a primary work, usually a journal article, such as supporting-information files, supplementary figures, tables, or appendices.

Note: book-review, conference-abstract, conference-paper, data-paper, and software-paper are newly added to the vocabulary. They are being rolled out, so coverage is currently low or zero and they may not yet appear under works?group_by=type.

Fields

Each work type is a small object. Fields shared with other entities are documented once on Common fields.

`id`

String. The OpenAlex ID for this type, e.g. https://openalex.org/types/article. See Common fields.

`display_name`

String. The human-readable name of the type — identical to the ID’s final segment (article, dataset). See Common fields.

`description`

String. A one-line definition of the type (the same text shown in the Values table above).

`works_count`

Integer. How many works carry this type. See Common fields.

`cited_by_count`

Integer. Total citations across all works of this type. See Common fields.

`works_api_url`

String. A ready-made Works API URL listing every work of this type, e.g. https://api.openalex.org/works?filter=type:article.

`crossref_types`

List. The Crossref type strings that map onto this OpenAlex type — the source-standard values this label standardizes. Available as a selectable column; not returned in the default object.

`created_date`

String. The date this type was added to OpenAlex (YYYY-MM-DD). See Common fields.

`updated_date`

String. The ISO 8601 UTC timestamp of the last change to this type object. See Common fields.

In the API

The work-types endpoint is at api.openalex.org/work-types; fetch a single type by ID at /work-types/article. Its main use is filtering works by type: filter=type:dataset, or group works by type with group_by=type. See Filtering for filter syntax and the endpoints index for all endpoints. The paratext type replaces the deprecated boolean is_paratext field — filter type:paratext instead of is_paratext:true.

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