Currencylayer

Currencylayer is a real-time and historical foreign exchange rate JSON API delivering bank-grade exchange rate data for 168 world currencies and precious metals, sourced from 15+ commercial-grade providers. The service is delivered through the APILayer marketplace under a freemium subscription model with refresh cadence ranging from hourly on Free up to 60 seconds on Enterprise tiers.

• APIs.yml: apis.yml
• Website: https://currencylayer.com
• Documentation: https://docs.apilayer.com/currencylayer/docs/api-documentation
• API Reference: https://apilayer.com/marketplace/currency_data-api
• Parent provider: APILayer

Type and Tier

• x-type: company
• x-tier: 3 (bulk-registered from public-apis)
• x-parent: apilayer
• Source: public-apis/public-apis — category: Currency Exchange

API Surface

Method	Endpoint	Summary	Min Plan
GET	/list	List Supported Currencies	Free
GET	/live	Get Live Exchange Rates	Free
GET	/historical	Get Historical Exchange Rates	Free
GET	/convert	Convert Currency Amount	Basic
GET	/timeframe	Get Time-Frame Exchange Rates	Enterprise
GET	/change	Get Currency Change Data	Enterprise Plus

Base URL: https://api.apilayer.com/currency_data · Auth: apikey header (modern) or access_key query (legacy).

Artifacts

Contract

• openapi/currencylayer-openapi.yml — full OpenAPI 3.0 contract with all six operations and the success/error envelope.

Schemas

• json-schema/currencylayer-quotes-schema.json
• json-schema/currencylayer-currencies-schema.json
• json-schema/currencylayer-convert-schema.json
• json-schema/currencylayer-timeframe-schema.json
• json-schema/currencylayer-change-schema.json
• json-schema/currencylayer-error-schema.json

JSON Structure

• json-structure/currencylayer-quotes-structure.json
• json-structure/currencylayer-currencies-structure.json
• json-structure/currencylayer-convert-structure.json
• json-structure/currencylayer-timeframe-structure.json
• json-structure/currencylayer-change-structure.json

JSON-LD Context

• json-ld/currencylayer-context.jsonld — semantic mapping for the Currencylayer response envelope.

Examples

• examples/currencylayer-listcurrencies-example.json
• examples/currencylayer-getlive-example.json
• examples/currencylayer-gethistorical-example.json
• examples/currencylayer-convertcurrency-example.json
• examples/currencylayer-gettimeframe-example.json
• examples/currencylayer-getchange-example.json

Spectral Rules

• rules/currencylayer-rules.yml — enforces operationId / summary / Title Case / Currencylayer envelope / apikey auth conventions.

Naftiko Capabilities

• capabilities/shared/currencylayer-shared.yaml — per-API operation primitives with plan gating.
• capabilities/currency-conversion.yaml — convert an amount with /live fallback.
• capabilities/historical-rate-lookup.yaml — point-in-time rate lookup for reconciliation and audit.
• capabilities/treasury-reporting.yaml — daily window FX exposure report via /timeframe + /change.
• capabilities/ecommerce-multi-currency-pricing.yaml — storefront price localization with caching.

Vocabulary

• vocabulary/currencylayer-vocabulary.yml — resources, endpoints, parameters, capabilities, commercial dimensions, and data sources.

Commercial & FinOps

• plans/currencylayer-plans-pricing.yml — Free, Basic ($14.99), Professional ($39.99), Enterprise ($59.99), Enterprise Plus ($99.99), Custom.
• rate-limits/currencylayer-rate-limits.yml — monthly quotas, overage policy, freshness cadence.
• finops/currencylayer-finops.yml — FOCUS mapping, allocation tags, optimization plays.

Plan and Feature Gating

Plan	Price (mo)	Requests/mo	Refresh	HTTPS	Source Switching	/convert	/timeframe	/change
Free	$0	100	Hourly	No	No (USD)	No	No	No
Basic	$14.99	10,000	Hourly	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Professional	$39.99	100,000	10-min	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Enterprise	$59.99	100,000	60-sec	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Enterprise Plus	$99.99	500,000	60-sec	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Custom	Contact	Volume	60-sec	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes

Overage pricing per request: Basic $0.005996 · Professional / Enterprise $0.0023996 · Enterprise Plus $0.00079992 · Custom negotiated. Annual billing offers ~10-15% effective savings.

Authentication

Currencylayer supports two authentication surfaces:

Surface	Endpoint	Mechanism
Modern (recommended)	https://api.apilayer.com/currency_data/*	apikey HTTP header
Legacy	https://api.currencylayer.com/* (and http:// on Free)	access_key= query parameter

Error Envelope

{
  "success": false,
  "error": {
    "code": 104,
    "type": "monthly_usage_limit_reached",
    "info": "Your monthly API request volume has been reached. Please upgrade your Subscription Plan."
  }
}

Known codes: 101 (invalid key), 103 (no such function), 104 (quota exceeded), 105 (plan does not include feature), 106 (no results), 404 (not found).

Tags

Currency Exchange, Foreign Exchange, FX, Forex, Conversion, Historical Rates, Time Frame, Change Report, Precious Metals, APILayer, Public APIs

Timestamps

• Created: 2026-05-28
• Modified: 2026-05-29

Maintainers

• Kin Lane — kin@apievangelist.com