API - Categories - Retrieve List | API

Retrieve the list of inventory categories for your account. Use this endpoint to get category IDs and names for building menus, syncing sites, or driving other API calls.

Method	URL	API key permission	Package
`GET`	`https://rental.software/api6/categories_list`	Settings Categories: Read Only or Full Access	WP/API

Prerequisites

An active API key created under Settings > API Keys. Include it as ?apiKey=YOUR_API_KEY on the request URL. See API - Setup Access.
Give the API key access to Settings Categories in its permissions.
Categories must be turned on in your account.
When creating a key, it is recommended to restrict allowed IP addresses to the servers that will make the calls (optional but recommended).

Step-by-Step Instructions

Generate or copy an API key from Settings > API Keys.
Build a GET request to the categories_list endpoint and include your API key plus any filters:
```
GET https://rental.software/api6/categories_list/?apiKey=YOUR_API_KEY&offset=0&limit=25
```

Send the request (example using curl):

curl "https://rental.software/api6/categories_list/?apiKey=YOUR_API_KEY&offset=0&limit=25" -H "Accept: application/json"

Inspect the JSON response for the items array containing the category records.

Parameters

Parameter	Default	Description
`apiKey`		Required. Your API key
`limit`	All	Number of records to return. If you leave it out, every category is returned in one response
`offset`	`0`	Start record number for paging. Only used when `limit` is also sent
`location_id`		Multi-location accounts only. Returns the categories of that location
`wpid`		ID of a WordPress sync (the ID number at the end of the URL when viewing the sync entry in IO). When sent, the categories come back in the display order set for that website

Response (Example)

{
  "offset": 0,
  "limit": 25,
  "first": "https://rental.software/api6/categories?offset=0&limit=25",
  "next": "https://rental.software/api6/categories?offset=25&limit=25",
  "previous": "https://rental.software/api6/categories?offset=0&limit=25",
  "items": [
    {
      "id": "19912",
      "href": "https://rental.software/api6/rentals?categoryid=19912",
      "name": "Moonwalks & Bounce Houses",
      "imageloc": "https://rental.software/users/images/example-category-small.jpg",
      "imagelocbig": "https://rental.software/users/images/example-category-large.jpg",
      "description": "",
      "order": "1",
      "wordpress_urls": [],
      "location_id": "0"
    },
    {
      "id": "928",
      "href": "https://rental.software/api6/rentals?categoryid=928",
      "name": "Equipment",
      "imageloc": "",
      "imagelocbig": "",
      "description": "",
      "order": "13",
      "wordpress_urls": [],
      "location_id": "0"
    }
  ],
  "request_time": 1760000000
}

Returned Fields

Field	Description
`offset`, `limit`, `first`, `next`, `previous`	Paging values and paging URLs. Only present when you send a `limit`
`items`	Array of category objects
`id`, `name`, `description`	Category ID, name and description
`href`	API URL that lists the rentals in this category
`imageloc`, `imagelocbig`	URLs of the small and large category image
`order`	Display order of the category
`wordpress_urls`	The category's page on each of your synced WordPress sites, as a list of `website` and `relative_url`
`location_id`	Location the category belongs to (`0` on single location accounts)

Use Cases

Populate a navigation menu or category list on your website or external app using category id and name.
Get a category id to pass into the Rentals endpoint to retrieve all rentals in that category. See API - Rentals - Retrieve List.

Troubleshooting & FAQs

What you see	What it means	What to do
`401` "No API Key provided"	The request has no `apiKey`	Add `?apiKey=YOUR_API_KEY` to the URL
`404` "No categories found"	No categories matched	Check the `location_id` you sent, or page back to an earlier `offset`
`405` "Categories are turned off"	Your account is not using categories	This endpoint only works for accounts that use categories
`429` "Too Many Requests"	You exceeded a rate limit	Wait, then retry less often. See API - Errors and Rate Limits

No paging values in the response? They are only included when you send a limit. Without one, all categories are returned at once.

Category IDs for Rentals. Use the category id from this response when calling the Rentals list endpoint to retrieve rentals for that category.

API - Categories - Retrieve List