Overview - Getting Started

Kaltura API — Getting Started

The Kaltura platform exposes 100+ REST API services, a dozen client libraries, several front-end libraries, and embeddable experience components — covering content management, playback, AI enrichment, analytics, and more. This guide covers the fundamentals: how requests work, how to authenticate, how to batch calls for performance, and how to handle errors.

Base URL: https://www.kaltura.com/api_v3 (may differ by region/deployment)
Auth: All requests require a Kaltura Session (KS) — see Session Guide for details
Format: Form-encoded or JSON POST, format=1 for JSON responses

When to Use

• First-time Kaltura API developers use this guide to understand request structure, authentication, error handling, and the content model before diving into specific services.
• Integration architects reference this guide for endpoint patterns, regional URL configuration, and best practices for batching API calls with multirequest.
• Development teams onboarding to Kaltura start here to set up their environment, make their first API call, and understand how entries, assets, and sessions relate.

Prerequisites

• Partner ID and Admin Secret: Available from your KMC under Settings > Integration Settings. See Getting Credentials for step-by-step setup.
• Service URL: Set $KALTURA_SERVICE_URL to your account's regional endpoint (default: https://www.kaltura.com/api_v3).
• A valid Kaltura Session (KS): Generate one using session.start as described in Session Guide. All API calls require a KS.
• curl or an HTTP client: All examples use curl. Any HTTP client that supports POST requests with form-encoded or JSON bodies works.