canonical: https://jentic.com/apis/cirium.io/cirium-fids

# Cirium FlightStats FIDS API

The Cirium FlightStats FIDS API powers airport flight information display systems by returning real-time arrivals and departures for a given airport. The API exposes two endpoints under https://api.flightstats.com - `/flex/fids/rest/v1/{format}/{airport}/arrivals` and `/flex/fids/rest/v1/{format}/{airport}/departures` - designed to feed terminal screens, mobile apps, and travel-itinerary tools. Authentication uses an appId plus appKey credential pair, supplied either as query parameters or HTTP headers, and the format path parameter selects JSON or XML responses.

## For AI agents

Fetch real-time arrival and departure boards for any airport from Cirium FlightStats with a simple appId and appKey API-key pair. Two endpoints power FIDS-style screens, travel apps, and flight-status agents.

## Scope

Does not handle ticket booking, fare pricing, or airline schedule changes - use for real-time airport arrivals and departures boards only.

## Capabilities

- Retrieve real-time arrivals for a specific airport by IATA or ICAO code
- Retrieve real-time departures for a specific airport in JSON or XML format
- Filter the FIDS feed by airport code path parameter for terminal-board displays
- Authenticate using appId and appKey via either query parameters or HTTP headers
- Power a travel-app flight board without scraping airline or airport websites
- Drive an airport information display screen with an authoritative aviation feed

## Use cases

### Powering an Airport Information Display

Airports and lounges run digital screens showing live arrivals and departures. The Cirium FIDS API returns the structured feed that drives those boards, by airport code and format, refreshed at the cadence the integrator polls. This replaces brittle scraping with a contract-backed feed used across hundreds of FIDS deployments.

Example prompt: GET `/flex/fids/rest/v1/json/LHR/arrivals` with appId and appKey and render the next 20 arrivals on the lounge screen.

### Travel App Flight Status Page

Consumer travel apps embed an airport-board view inside their itinerary screen. Calling the departures endpoint for the user's home airport gives the app a curated set of flights for that day, including scheduled and actual times, gate, and status, so a frequent flyer can monitor their next departure without leaving the app.

Example prompt: GET `/flex/fids/rest/v1/json/SFO/departures` and surface the user's flight UA123 with current gate and status.

### Operations Alerting on Delays

An airline ground-ops team can poll the arrivals endpoint for their hub on a fixed interval to detect flights that have slipped from on-time to delayed, then trigger an alert into Slack or PagerDuty. With only two endpoints to manage, the integration is light enough to run from a small scheduled job.

Example prompt: Every 5 minutes, GET `/flex/fids/rest/v1/json/ORD/arrivals` and post a delayed-flight summary into the ops channel.

### AI Agent Travel Assistant

An AI travel assistant invoked through Jentic can take a user's airport code and return a short narrative summary of arrivals or departures. Jentic isolates the appId and appKey in your Jentic One instance, so the agent never sees the raw credential, and the search-by-intent flow surfaces the right FIDS endpoint without the agent reading Cirium docs.

Example prompt: Search Jentic for 'get airport arrivals from Cirium', load GET `/flex/fids/rest/v1/{format}/{airport}/arrivals`, and return a one-paragraph summary of LHR arrivals.

## Key endpoints

| Method | Path | Description |
| --- | --- | --- |
| GET | `/flex/fids/rest/v1/{format}/{airport}/arrivals` | Real-time arrivals for an airport |
| GET | `/flex/fids/rest/v1/{format}/{airport}/departures` | Real-time departures for an airport |

## Key resources

- **Arrivals** — Real-time arrivals board feed by airport code
- **Departures** — Real-time departures board feed by airport code

## Why Jentic

- **Setup:** Wiring the Cirium FlightStats FIDS API by hand means managing its API key and formatting per-airport arrivals and departures requests against the FlightStats host yourself. Through Jentic you install once, import the Cirium FlightStats FIDS API from the API Directory, store the API key once, and your agent calls it.
- **Permission scoping:** This API is read-only and puts the airport code in the URL path (/{airport}/arrivals), so scope the agent to the two operations it needs: fetching arrivals and departures boards. You choose the operations it may call, so it can be limited to departures alone if that is all it needs.
- **Credential handling:** Your Cirium API key is stored once, encrypted, by your own Jentic One instance and injected at execution time. It never enters the agent's prompt, logs, or context.
- **Discovery method:** Agents search Jentic by intent such as 'get airport arrivals' or 'get a departures board', and Jentic returns the matching Cirium operation with its input schema so the agent calls the right endpoint without browsing the reference docs.

## Related APIs

- **Cirium FlightStats FIDS API (Studios)** — Mirror FIDS spec served from the Cirium Studios developer portal.
- **Cisco API** — Cisco signage and infrastructure APIs can power the screens that render Cirium FIDS data.
- **Circle Community API** — Circle hosts traveller communities that consume Cirium flight-board summaries.

## FAQ

### What authentication does the Cirium FlightStats FIDS API use?

The FIDS API uses an appId and appKey credential pair. They can be supplied as query parameters (appId, appKey) or as HTTP headers with the same names. Through Jentic, both values are stored encrypted in your Jentic One instance and never enter the agent's prompt.

### Can I get both arrivals and departures from one call?

No - the FIDS API uses two separate endpoints. Call GET `/flex/fids/rest/v1/{format}/{airport}/arrivals` for arrivals and GET `/flex/fids/rest/v1/{format}/{airport}/departures` for departures. An integration that needs both should call them in parallel.

### What are the rate limits for the FIDS API?

Rate limits are not defined in the OpenAPI spec; they are governed by your Cirium FlightStats subscription tier. Coordinate polling frequency with your account agreement and let Jentic surface 429 responses if the limit is exceeded.

### How do I fetch an airport board through Jentic?

Run pip install jentic, then search Jentic for 'get airport arrivals from Cirium'. Jentic returns the GET `/flex/fids/rest/v1/{format}/{airport}/arrivals` operation. Supply format=json and airport=LHR and execute. Get started with Jentic One, the self-hosted execution layer.

### Which response formats does the FIDS API support?

The format path parameter accepts json or xml. JSON is the typical choice for modern integrations; XML is supported for legacy signage systems.

### Can I filter by terminal or airline?

The two FIDS endpoints scope by airport code only. To filter by airline or terminal, post-process the response client-side, or look at other Cirium FlightStats APIs that expose schedule and operational detail.

### Can I limit what my agent is allowed to do with the Cirium FlightStats FIDS API?

Yes. Because Jentic One is self-hosted, you set the rules that decide which operations and credentials your agent may use. This API is read-only and has just two operations, fetching the arrivals board and the departures board by airport code, so you can grant your agent both or restrict it to departures alone if that is all it needs. The appId and appKey stay under your control and are injected only for the calls you have allowed.