canonical: https://jentic.com/apis/data.crunchbase.com/crunchbase

# Data Crunchbase Crunchbase API

Jentic publishes the only available OpenAPI specification for Crunchbase API, keeping it validated and agent-ready. Crunchbase is the canonical dataset of private companies, funding rounds, acquisitions, and people in the global startup ecosystem. The API exposes nine endpoints across search, autocomplete, and entity retrieval covering organizations, people, funding rounds, and acquisitions. Authentication uses an API key passed as the user_key query parameter against the https://api.crunchbase.com/api/v4 base URL.

## For AI agents

Search Crunchbase organizations, people, funding rounds, and acquisitions and retrieve full entity records to enrich CRM and prospecting workflows.

## Scope

Does not handle email enrichment, web traffic data, or technographics - use for Crunchbase organization, people, funding round, and acquisition data only.

## Capabilities

- Search organizations across the Crunchbase database with structured filters
- Search people by role, location, and organization affiliation
- Search funding rounds and acquisitions by date, size, and investor
- Retrieve full Crunchbase entity records for organizations, people, funding rounds, and acquisitions
- Resolve autocomplete queries for organization and person pickers
- Authenticate via the user_key query parameter scoped to the calling account

## Use cases

### Outbound Sales Prospecting

Build a target account list of recently funded companies with structured filters instead of scraping news. POST `/searches/organizations` supports filters by funding stage, industry, geography, and date, and GET `/entities/organizations/{entity_id}` returns the full company profile for downstream CRM enrichment. Suitable for sales teams targeting venture-backed companies.

Example prompt: Search organizations matching 'Series B' funding stage in 'fintech' from the last 12 months, then retrieve full profiles for the top 25 results.

### Investor and Acquisition Tracking

Track a specific investor's portfolio activity or watch acquisitions in a sector. POST `/searches/funding_rounds` and POST `/searches/acquisitions` accept investor and acquirer filters, and the matching GET endpoints return full deal records. Useful for venture analysts, M and A teams, and investor-relations functions.

Example prompt: Search funding rounds led by a target investor in the last 90 days, then retrieve each round entity and produce a markdown digest grouped by industry.

### CRM Account Enrichment

Enrich CRM company records with Crunchbase firmographics and funding history at sync time. GET `/entities/organizations/{entity_id}` returns the canonical record for an org, and POST `/searches/organizations` resolves company name and domain to an entity. Useful for sales operations teams keeping Salesforce or HubSpot accounts current.

Example prompt: For each company domain in the CRM nightly sync, search organizations to resolve the entity ID and pull the full GET `/entities/organizations/{entity_id}` record into the CRM custom fields.

### Founder and Executive Research

Research founders or executives by querying Crunchbase people records and joining them with their organization affiliations. POST `/searches/people` accepts role and organization filters, and GET `/entities/people/{entity_id}` returns the full profile. Useful for executive recruiting, journalism, and competitive research.

Example prompt: Search people with role 'Founder' at organizations in 'climate tech' and return the top 20 person entity records.

### Agent-Driven Market Research via Jentic

AI agents that produce competitive briefs, deal sheets, or sourcing lists can call Crunchbase through Jentic without holding the user_key. The agent searches Jentic for the relevant intent, loads the schema, and runs the search or entity lookup with the key held in Jentic's vault. This keeps the Crunchbase subscription credential isolated from the agent's prompt context.

Example prompt: Use Jentic to search 'search crunchbase organizations', load POST `/searches/organizations`, and execute it with the user's industry and funding-stage filters.

## Key endpoints

| Method | Path | Description |
| --- | --- | --- |
| POST | `/searches/organizations` | Search organizations with structured filters |
| POST | `/searches/people` | Search people across the dataset |
| POST | `/searches/funding_rounds` | Search funding rounds |
| POST | `/searches/acquisitions` | Search acquisitions |
| GET | `/autocompletes` | Resolve autocomplete suggestions |
| GET | `/entities/organizations/{entity_id}` | Get an organization entity |
| GET | `/entities/people/{entity_id}` | Get a person entity |
| GET | `/entities/funding_rounds/{entity_id}` | Get a funding round entity |

## Key resources

- **Search** — Search organizations, people, funding rounds, and acquisitions
- **Entities** — Retrieve full records for organizations, people, funding rounds, and acquisitions
- **Autocomplete** — Resolve typeahead suggestions for entities

## Why Jentic

- **Setup:** Wiring Crunchbase by hand means learning its user_key query auth against api.crunchbase.com/api/v4 and building the search and retry plumbing for organizations, people, and funding rounds yourself. Through Jentic you install once, import the Crunchbase API from the API Directory, store the key once, and your agent calls it.
- **Permission scoping:** Crunchbase drives its search endpoints from the request body while entity reads take an entity_id in the path (`/entities/organizations/{entity_id}`), so limit the agent to the operations it needs, such as searching organizations or fetching one entity. This API is read-only here, so the agent can only query what you allow it to query.
- **Credential handling:** Your Crunchbase user_key is stored once, encrypted, by your own Jentic One instance and appended as the user_key query parameter at execution time. It never enters the agent's prompt, logs, or context.
- **Discovery method:** Agents search Jentic by intent such as 'search Crunchbase organizations' or 'fetch a funding round', and Jentic returns the matching operation with its input schema so the agent calls the right endpoint without browsing the data.crunchbase.com docs.

## Related APIs

- **Clearbit API** — Clearbit focuses on company and person enrichment by domain or email; Crunchbase emphasises funding and deal data.
- **People Data Labs API** — PDL provides large-scale person enrichment; Crunchbase covers companies, deals, and funding rounds.
- **Salesforce API** — Salesforce stores accounts and opportunities; Crunchbase enriches them with firmographic and funding data.

## FAQ

### Why is there no official OpenAPI spec for Crunchbase API?

Crunchbase publishes only descriptive documentation. Jentic generates and maintains this OpenAPI specification so that AI agents and developers can call Crunchbase API via structured tooling. It is validated against the live API and kept up to date. Get started with Jentic One, the self-hosted execution layer.

### What authentication does the Crunchbase API use?

The Crunchbase API uses an API key passed as the user_key query parameter on every request. Through Jentic the user_key is held in the vault and appended to outbound requests so it never enters the agent's context.

### Can I search funding rounds with the Crunchbase API?

Yes. POST `/searches/funding_rounds` accepts structured filters such as date range, investor, and round size, and GET `/entities/funding_rounds/{entity_id}` returns the full record for a specific round.

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

The OpenAPI spec does not declare explicit numeric limits. Limits are governed by your Crunchbase data licence - apply backoff on 429 responses and prefer paginated search calls over high-frequency entity lookups.

### How do I enrich a CRM record through Jentic?

Run pip install jentic, then search Jentic for 'search crunchbase organizations', load the POST `/searches/organizations` schema, and execute it with the company name or domain. Pipe the resulting entity_id into GET `/entities/organizations/{entity_id}` for the full record.

### Does the Crunchbase API support autocomplete?

Yes. GET /autocompletes accepts a query and returns matching organizations and people, suitable for typeahead pickers in CRM and prospecting tools.

### Can I limit what my agent is allowed to do with the Crunchbase API?

Yes. Because you run Jentic One yourself, your own rules decide which Crunchbase operations and credentials the agent may use, so you can restrict it to just the calls it needs, such as POST `/searches/organizations` or a single GET `/entities/organizations/{entity_id}` read. The Crunchbase API is read-only here, so the agent can only query the data you allow and cannot write or modify anything. You can grant search access to people, funding rounds, and acquisitions selectively or withhold it, keeping the user_key credential under your control.