Introduction

ApiFlash is a simple yet powerful screenshot API that any modern company can easily use to make pixel perfect website screenshots at scale. An up to date version of Chrome is used to ensure that all modern web features are fully supported and that rendering is exactly as you would expect. It's also built over AWS Lambda to make sure that it truly scales and keeps being stable under heavy workloads.

We're one of the most cost efficient screenshot API out there and we are dedicated to provide an awesome service to all companies, big or small.

Access
The API can be accessed through a unique HTTPS endpoint that supports both GET and POST methods.
GET https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage
└ Parameters are passed through query string.
POST https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage
└ Parameters are passed as form data.
All API calls needs to be authenticated using a valid access key that can be found in the dashboard. For a GET request, the access key is passed in the query string as all other parameters.
GET https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage?access_key=YOUR_ACCESS_KEY
For a POST request, the access key is passed as form data as every other parameter.

By default the API returns directly the screenshot image data. It also passes along the appropriate Content-Type and Content-Length headers. If the response_type parameter is set to json, then the response contains a JSON document with links to the resulting screenshot.
Parameters
The table bellow contains all the available parameters of our screenshot API.
To use them, simply include them in the query string or form data of your API calls.
GET https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage?param1=value1&param2=value2...
Please also note that some parameter values need to be URL encoded to be processed correctly.
Sort
Parameter Default Description
required in pixels in seconds in meters
No results found for search: ""

Please try again with a different search query.

Examples
The following examples make a HTTP request to the API and save the screenshot to a screenshot.jpeg file. 
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using System.Net;

public class ApiFlashExample
{
    private const string ApiFlashEndpoint = "https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage";

    public static void Main ()
    {
        using(var webClient = new WebClient())
        {
            // The System.Web assembly reference is required.
            var parameters = System.Web.HttpUtility.ParseQueryString(string.Empty);
            parameters["access_key"] = "YOUR_ACCESS_KEY";
            parameters["url"] = "https://example.com";

            webClient.DownloadFile(ApiFlashEndpoint + "?" + parameters, "screenshot.jpeg");
        }
    }
}

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endpoint="https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage"
access_key="YOUR_ACCESS_KEY"
url="https://example.com"

curl --request GET --url "${endpoint}?access_key=${access_key}&url=${url}" > screenshot.jpeg

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package main

import (
	"io"
	"net/http"
	"os"
)

func main() {

	apiFlashEndpoint := "https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage"
	request, _ := http.NewRequest("GET", apiFlashEndpoint, nil)
	query := request.URL.Query()
	query.Add("access_key", "YOUR_ACCESS_KEY")
	query.Add("url", "https://example.com")
	request.URL.RawQuery = query.Encode()

	client := &http.Client{}
	response, _ := client.Do(request)
	defer response.Body.Close()

	image, _ := os.Create("screenshot.jpeg")
	io.Copy(image, response.Body)
	image.Close()

}

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import java.io.FileOutputStream;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
import java.io.OutputStream;
import java.net.URL;

public class Main {

    private static String ACCESS_KEY = "YOUR_ACCESS_KEY";
    private static String APIFLASH_ENDPOINT = "https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage";

    public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {

        String params = String.format("?access_key=%s&url=https://example.com", ACCESS_KEY);
        URL apiCallUrl = new URL(APIFLASH_ENDPOINT + params);
        InputStream inputStream = apiCallUrl.openStream();
        OutputStream outputStream = new FileOutputStream("screenshot.jpeg");

        byte[] b = new byte[2048];
        int length;

        while ((length = inputStream.read(b)) != -1) {
            outputStream.write(b, 0, length);
        }

        inputStream.close();
        outputStream.close();
    }
}

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const https = require('https');
const fs = require('fs');

https.get("https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage?" + new URLSearchParams({
    access_key: "YOUR_ACCESS_KEY",
    url: "https://example.com"
}).toString(), (response) => {
    response.pipe(fs.createWriteStream('screenshot.jpeg'));
});

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<?php

$params = http_build_query(array(
    "access_key" => "YOUR_ACCESS_KEY",
    "url" => "https://example.com",
));

$image_data = file_get_contents("https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage?" . $params);
file_put_contents("screenshot.jpeg", $image_data);

?>;

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from urllib.parse import urlencode
from urllib.request import urlretrieve

params = urlencode(dict(access_key="YOUR_ACCESS_KEY",
                        url="https://example.com"))
urlretrieve("https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage?" + params, "screenshot.jpeg")

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require "open-uri"

File.open('screenshot.jpeg', 'wb') do |fo|
  params = URI.encode_www_form("access_key" => "YOUR_ACCESS_KEY",
                               "url" => "https://example.com")
  fo.write open("https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage?" + params).read
end
Rate limits
The API is rate limited using the leaky bucket algorithm with a request rate of 20 requests per second and a burst size of 400 requests. In practice, if the requests rate exceeds 20 requests per second, their processing is delayed such that requests are processed at the defined rate. Excessive requests are delayed until their number exceeds the burst size of 400 requests in which case the additional requests are terminated with a status code 429.

API calls that have the exact same parameters (same url, same width, etc.) and that fail to capture a screenshot (unreachable website, domains not registered, etc.) are rate limited to 5 requests per hour.
Quota
To monitor the use of your quota, you can use the HTTP headers included in the response of any API call that successfully captured a screenshot.
Header Name Description
X-Quota-Limit The maximum number of API calls you can make per billing period.
X-Quota-Remaining The number of API calls remaining for the current billing period.
X-Quota-Reset The time, in UTC epoch seconds, at which the current billing period ends
and the remaining number of API calls resets.
You can also call the dedicated quota endpoint.
GET https://api.apiflash.com/v1/urltoimage/quota?access_key=YOUR_ACCESS_KEY
Here is an example of the json returned in the response body. 
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{
    "limit": 10000,
    "remaining": 5400,
    "reset": 1584549777
}
Errors
If our screenshot API fails to capture a web page, the API response will contain an appropriate status code.
The list of possible status codes with their corresponding description can be found in the table bellow.
Status Code Description
400 Bad Request Either the API call contains invalid parameters or the target URL cannot be captured.
401 Unauthorized The access key used to make this API call has been revoked or is invalid.
402 Payment Required The monthly screenshot quota has been exceeded for the user's current plan.
403 Forbidden The current plan does not support some of the features requested through API parameters.
429 Too Many Requests Too many API calls have been made. The specific reason is included in the response body.
500 Internal Server Error The screenshot capture failed because our API failed to handle the encountered situation.
When our API responds with a status code 400, it also provides a meaningful error message to help you understand the root cause of the error. If the response_type parameter is set to json, an error type as well as additional information might also be returned depending on the type of error.