Pro and API plans
Open Library
Find the book, paper or archive item once instead of searching six catalogues, and bring the public-domain ones into your research.
Published · Reviewed
Who it is for
- Researchers and students
- Writers
- Analysts
The problem
Public catalogues each hold a different slice of what is freely available, and every one has its own search.
How GistCite solves it
Search by title, author, subject, ISBN or DOI across all sources at once; results are merged, and free-to-keep items can be downloaded and extracted like any other document.
Capabilities
Merged search
Six catalogues, one query, results merged and deduplicated.
Benefit: Find it once.
Search books and papersDownload and extract
Public-domain and open-access items download straight into the Document Extractor.
Benefit: From citation to cited summary.
Download a public-domain bookBenefits
- Live search against every source; nothing is indexed or copied.
- Respects each source's licence: only free-to-keep items download.
How it works
Step 1
Search
Title, author, subject, ISBN or DOI.
Step 2
Choose
See which sources hold the item and which files are free.
Step 3
Download
Extract, summarize and cite.
Integrations and formats
- Google Books
- Open Library
- Project Gutenberg
- arXiv
- OpenAlex
- Internet Archive
- Document Extractor
Security and data handling
Read the full picture on the security and compliance page.
- Only public catalogue data and public-domain files are fetched.
- Every extraction endpoint is rate-limited per IP; signed-in use is metered against the plan's monthly quota.
- TLS in transit; passwords bcrypt-hashed; API keys stored only as SHA-256 digests.
Evidence
- Sources and merge rules are documented in the Open Library spec and decision record. Check this
Worked examples
Graduate student
From a twelve-lecture playlist and two textbooks to a searchable study corpus
A public lecture playlist and two public-domain textbooks become one set of transcripts, summaries and chunked JSON, ready for revision or a personal AI index.
Read the graduate student walkthroughPricing
- Plans
- Pro and API
- Cost per action
- 1 unit per download, then normal extraction costs.
- How it is priced
- Searching is free on paid plans.
Open Library questions
- Can I download any book?
- Only items each source marks as free to keep: public-domain books and open-access papers.
Try Open Library now
Sign in and start a Pro plan, or begin with the free tools and upgrade when you need this one.
Prefer to talk first? Contact the team · Read the API documentation