Openverse API
The programming interface of the Openverse engine, run by WordPress, which indexes openly licensed media. Your agent queries it over HTTP (an audio search, with filters by licence and by source) and gets, for each sound, the file link, its author, its licence and an attribution line ready to paste. On November 12, 2026, 5.2 million audio files from three sources: Wikimedia, Jamendo (mostly music) and Freesound (the sound effects, a little under 600,000). MIT-licensed code.
Strengths
- Usable with no account or key: the agent runs its audio search from the very first request
- Each result carries the author, the licence and an attribution line already written, to copy as is
- Filters by licence (CC0, public domain, commercial use, modification allowed) and by source, to keep only what you are allowed to use
Limitations
- Openverse does not verify the licences it indexes: checking the right of use before publishing is on you
- The "sound effect" category filter returns no result as of November 12, 2026, whatever the source: filter by source (Freesound for sound effects) rather than by category
- The 5 million total is mostly Wikimedia recordings and music: the sound effects useful for editing are a minority
- Tight anonymous limits (20 results per page, 240 at most per search) and scraping the catalogue is forbidden by the terms of service
Best for
- Creators who have an agent edit their videos and want real, openly licensed sound effects, with the author credit