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Overview - Content Management

Categories & Entitlements Overview​

The Categories & Entitlements API covers content organization and user-based content permissions: creating category hierarchies (KalturaCategory), managing category membership (categoryUser), assigning content to categories (categoryEntry), and enforcing content visibility through the entitlement system. Categories are the foundation for Kaltura's entitlement system, which restricts content visibility based on privacy settings, user membership, and KS privileges.

Base URL: https://www.kaltura.com/api_v3 (may differ by region/deployment)
Auth: KS passed as ks parameter in POST form data (see Session Guide)
Format: Form-encoded POST, format=1 for JSON responses
Services: category (11 actions), categoryUser (10 actions), categoryEntry (9 actions)

When to Use​

  • Department-based content portals organize media into hierarchical categories with membership-based visibility so each team sees only its own content.
  • Multi-tenant applications use category entitlements to isolate content between business units, clients, or partner organizations within a single Kaltura account.
  • Premium content and subscriptions gate access to content categories based on paid subscriptions or membership levels.
  • Group collaboration channels let team members share and discover content visible only to the group.
  • Content operations teams manage large-scale content assignment, category restructuring, and bulk permission updates across thousands of entries.
  • Application-specific content scoping uses privacy contexts to separate entitlement rules per application while sharing content across one Kaltura account.

Prerequisites​

  • Kaltura Session (KS): ADMIN KS (type=2) with CONTENT_MANAGE_CATEGORY permission for category and membership operations, CONTENT_MANAGE_ASSIGN_ENTRY_TO_CATEGORY for content assignment. See Session Guide.
  • Partner ID and API credentials: Available from KMC > Settings > Integration Settings.
  • Service URL: Set $KALTURA_SERVICE_URL to your account's regional endpoint (default: https://www.kaltura.com/api_v3).
  • Entitlement feature: Category entitlements require activation on your account. Contact your Kaltura representative to enable entitlement if category privacy settings are needed.

Authentication​

All endpoints require an ADMIN KS (type=2) with appropriate permissions:

  • Category CRUD: CONTENT_MANAGE_CATEGORY permission
  • Category membership: CONTENT_MANAGE_CATEGORY permission
  • Content assignment: CONTENT_MANAGE_ASSIGN_ENTRY_TO_CATEGORY permission

Generate an ADMIN KS via session.start (see Session Guide) or appToken.startSession (see AppTokens Guide).

export KALTURA_SERVICE_URL="https://www.kaltura.com/api_v3"