Quickstart

This walks you through getting an API key and making your first request. It takes about two minutes.

1. Create an API key

You can call the API without a key: you get 50 calls a day for each address. A free API key gives you 200 calls a day, and your own games.

1. Open Settings → Developer. Sign in if you’re asked to. It’s free.
2. Select Create, name it after where you’ll use it (like “My server”), and select Create key.
3. Copy the key. It starts with rta_, and it’s only shown once.

Then keep it in an environment variable, not in your code:

export ROTERMINAL_API_KEY="rta_…"

2. Make a request

Ask for one game. You can name it by its universe ID or by its name.

curl https://roterminal.co/api/v1/games/7436755782 \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $ROTERMINAL_API_KEY"

import RoTerminal from 'roterminal'

const rt = new RoTerminal({ apiKey: process.env.ROTERMINAL_API_KEY })

const { data } = await rt.games.retrieve('grow a garden')

from roterminal import RoTerminal

rt = RoTerminal()  # reads ROTERMINAL_API_KEY

data = rt.games.retrieve("grow a garden")["data"]

3. Read the answer

{
  "data": {
    "id": 7436755782,
    "name": "Grow a Garden",
    "playing_now": 20523,
    "change_24h": -8.1,
    "place_on_roblox_by_players": { "rank": 57, "of": 33681 },
    "came_out": "2025-03-25",
    "last_updated": "2026-10-19T21:28:00-04:00"
  },
  "link": "https://roterminal.co/g/7436755782",
  "as_of": "2026-10-20T11:41:00-04:00"
}

• Numbers are numbers. A percent is in percent: -8.1 means down 8.1%.
• Times are ISO 8601 in New York time, with the offset. Days are YYYY-MM-DD.
• Every response has a link to the same numbers on roterminal.co. Link to it when you show them.

The response above is shortened. Retrieve a game lists every field.

4. Install an SDK (optional)

The JavaScript SDK is typed, retries for you and works in Node 18 and up, Deno, Bun and edge runtimes.

npm install roterminal

import RoTerminal from 'roterminal'

const rt = new RoTerminal({ apiKey: process.env.ROTERMINAL_API_KEY })

const { data } = await rt.games.rising({ range: '7d', limit: 5 })
for (const game of data.games) console.log(game.name, game.change)

Next steps

• Build a dashboard: a live page for your games, with AI or from a starter file.
• API reference: every endpoint, its parameters and its fields.
• Rate limits: calls a day, and the headers that tell you how many are left.
• Errors: what each error means and what to do.