canonical: https://jentic.com/apis/edmunds.com/edmunds

# Edmunds API

Jentic publishes the only available OpenAPI specification for Edmunds API, keeping it validated and agent-ready. The Edmunds API exposes the dataset behind Edmunds.com - vehicle specifications, True Market Value (TMV) and True Cost to Own (TCO) pricing, dealer information, vehicle photos, and dealer ratings and reviews. The 36 endpoints cover make, model, year, style, engine, transmission, colour, equipment, VIN decoding, new-and-used pricing, dealership lookups, and review submission. Authentication is a query-parameter API key, so it is straightforward to call from server-side automations, vehicle-research chat agents, or pricing tools.

## For AI agents

Look up vehicle specifications, market pricing, and dealer information by make, model, year, VIN, or style. Useful for car-research agents and pricing tools.

## Scope

Does not handle vehicle purchase transactions, financing applications, insurance quotes, or vehicle title transfers - use for vehicle data, pricing, dealer lookups, and reviews only.

## Capabilities

- Look up car makes, models, years, and styles by ID, slug, or filter
- Decode a VIN or squish-VIN into the underlying year, make, model, and style
- Retrieve True Market Value (TMV) for new, used, certified, and typically-equipped vehicles by style and ZIP code
- Pull True Cost to Own (TCO) data by make, model, and style across the five-year ownership window
- Find dealerships and franchises by ID, location, or make and read their dealer ratings and reviews
- Fetch vehicle equipment, engine, transmission, and colour records to populate research and comparison tools

## Use cases

### Car-research conversational agent

A consumer-facing chat agent helps shoppers narrow down a vehicle by asking about budget, body style, and brand preferences. The agent calls the Edmunds API to list makes and models, fetch styles for a chosen model year, and quote the TMV and TCO for a candidate trim in the user's ZIP code. Because every Edmunds operation is callable with a single API key in the query string, the agent can run end-to-end research without OAuth handshakes.

Example prompt: Given a user-stated budget and ZIP code, list candidate styles via `/api/vehicle/v3/styles` and return the TMV from `/v1/api/tmv/tmvservice/calculatenewtmv` for each candidate.

### VIN decoding and pricing for dealer tools

A dealer or marketplace tool accepts a VIN from a trade-in form and needs to derive the vehicle's year, make, model, and trim, then quote a fair market price. The Edmunds VIN decode endpoint resolves the VIN to a styleId, after which the TMV endpoints return new, used, certified, or typically-equipped pricing for that style. The combined flow drives consistent valuations across a dealer network.

Example prompt: Call GET `/api/vehicle/v2/vins/{vin}` to retrieve the styleId, then GET `/v1/api/tmv/tmvservice/calculateusedtmv` with that styleId and the customer's ZIP to return a used-vehicle price.

### Dealer discovery and reputation lookup

A car-buying assistant needs to surface dealerships that carry a chosen make, then show their reputation before recommending a visit. The Edmunds dealer endpoints list dealerships by make and franchise, and the dealer ratings and reviews endpoints return aggregate scores. The assistant can also submit a new review on behalf of an authenticated buyer.

Example prompt: List dealers for a make via `/api/dealer/v5/dealership/{dealershipId}/franchises`, then call `/v1/api/drrrepository/getdrrbydealerid` for each to return reputation scores.

### Edmunds API as an agent tool through Jentic

An AI agent platform exposes vehicle research as a callable tool. Through Jentic, the agent searches by intent ('look up car market value'), receives the matching Edmunds operation with its input schema, and executes the request. The agent never sees the raw API key, which Jentic injects at execution time.

Example prompt: Search Jentic for 'get the true market value of a vehicle', load the operation schema, and execute the call for a given make, model, year, and ZIP code.

## Key endpoints

| Method | Path | Description |
| --- | --- | --- |
| GET | `/api/vehicle/v3/makes` | List car makes |
| GET | `/api/vehicle/v3/styles` | List vehicle styles |
| GET | `/api/vehicle/v2/vins/{vin}` | Decode a VIN to its style |
| GET | `/v1/api/tmv/tmvservice/calculatenewtmv` | Get True Market Value for a new vehicle |
| GET | `/v1/api/tmv/tmvservice/calculateusedtmv` | Get True Market Value for a used vehicle |
| GET | `/v1/api/tco/getmakeswithtcodata` | List makes with True Cost to Own data |
| GET | `/api/media/v2/{make}/{model}/{year}/photos` | Get vehicle photos |

## Key resources

- **Vehicle Specs** — Browse makes, models, years, styles, engines, transmissions, colours, and equipment
- **VIN** — Decode VINs and squish VINs into structured vehicle data
- **Pricing** — Calculate True Market Value and True Cost to Own for new, used, and certified vehicles
- **Dealer** — Look up dealerships, franchises, and dealer ratings and reviews
- **Media** — Retrieve vehicle photos by make, model, and year

## Why Jentic

- **Setup:** Wiring the Edmunds API by hand means appending its api_key query parameter on every request across vehicle, pricing, dealer, and media endpoints on the api.edmunds.com host. Through Jentic you install once, import the Edmunds API from the API Directory, store the api_key once, and your agent calls it.
- **Permission scoping:** Many Edmunds operations put the resource id in the URL path, such as `/api/vehicle/v2/vins/{vin}` and `/api/media/v2/{make}/{model}/{year}/photos`, so a rule can pin your agent to one VIN or one make and model. Every endpoint here is read-only, so you allow the vehicle-data and pricing lookups the agent needs and it cannot change any record.
- **Credential handling:** Your Edmunds api_key is stored once, encrypted, by your own Jentic One instance and injected as the request query parameter at execution time. It never enters the agent's prompt, logs, or context.
- **Discovery method:** Agents search Jentic by intent such as 'decode a VIN' or 'get the market value of a used car', and Jentic returns the matching Edmunds operation with its input schema so the agent calls the right endpoint without browsing the reference docs.

## Related APIs

- **NHTSA Vehicle API** — NHTSA offers free public VIN decoding, recall, and complaint data, without TMV pricing or dealer information.
- **Marketstack API** — Marketstack provides equity-market pricing data - useful when an automotive workflow also tracks public auto-maker financials.
- **Twilio API** — Twilio sends SMS notifications to buyers once a vehicle valuation or dealer match is ready.

## FAQ

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

Edmunds does not publish an OpenAPI specification. Jentic generates and maintains this spec so that AI agents and developers can call Edmunds 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 Edmunds API use?

Edmunds uses an API key passed as the api_key query parameter on every request. Jentic stores the key encrypted in its vault and injects it at execution time so the agent never receives the raw secret.

### Can I decode a VIN with the Edmunds API?

Yes. GET `/api/vehicle/v2/vins/{vin}` decodes a full VIN, and GET `/api/vehicle/v2/squishvins/{squishVin}` decodes a 10-character squish VIN, returning the year, make, model, and styleId.

### How do I get True Market Value pricing through Jentic?

Run pip install jentic, search Jentic for 'get the true market value of a new car', load the schema for `/v1/api/tmv/tmvservice/calculatenewtmv`, and execute with the styleId and ZIP code. Jentic returns the price payload for the agent to use.

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

Rate limits are not declared in the OpenAPI spec and depend on the API key tier issued by Edmunds. Build retries with exponential backoff and cache lookups of static reference data such as makes and models to reduce call volume.

### Can I find dealers and read their reviews with this API?

Yes. The dealer endpoints list dealerships and their franchises, and the dealer ratings and reviews endpoint returns scores by dealer ID. There is also a POST `/api/dealerreviews/v2` endpoint to submit a new review.

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

Yes. Because you run Jentic One yourself, your own rules decide which Edmunds operations and credentials the agent may use, and every Edmunds endpoint here is read-only, so you can allow only the vehicle-data and pricing lookups it needs without risking any change to a record. Many operations carry the resource id in the URL path, such as `/api/vehicle/v2/vins/{vin}` and `/api/media/v2/{make}/{model}/{year}/photos`, so a rule can pin the agent to a single VIN or one make and model. You can also grant just the calls a task requires, for example VIN decoding and True Market Value pricing, while withholding dealer or review endpoints.