NASA Open Data Scraper

Search and extract metadata from NASA's Open Data Portal — powered by CKAN with 40,000+ NASA datasets covering Earth science, space exploration, aeronautics, climate, and more. No API key required.

What you can scrape

• Datasets — titles, descriptions, resources (files), tags, organization, license, metadata dates, resource counts
• Dataset detail — full metadata for specific datasets by ID or slug
• Organizations — NASA organizations publishing open data, with package counts

Use cases

• NASA research data discovery and analysis
• Finding Earth science, climate, or space datasets
• Academic and scientific research
• Building data pipelines from NASA open sources
• Tracking dataset availability by NASA program
• Discovering datasets in specific formats (CSV, GeoJSON, HDF, FITS, etc.)

Input

Field	Type	Description
mode	select	searchDatasets (default), getDatasetDetail, or listOrganizations
searchQuery	string	Keyword(s) to search dataset titles and descriptions
organization	string	Filter by NASA organization slug (e.g. nasa)
format	select	Filter by resource format: CSV, JSON, GeoJSON, ZIP, PDF, etc.
sortBy	select	Sort by relevance, recently modified, recently added, or name
datasetIds	array	Dataset IDs or slugs for getDatasetDetail mode
maxItems	integer	Max records to return (1–5000, default 25)

Example inputs

Search climate datasets:

{
  "mode": "searchDatasets",
  "searchQuery": "climate",
  "maxItems": 50
}

Search Mars datasets in ZIP format:

{
  "mode": "searchDatasets",
  "searchQuery": "mars",
  "format": "ZIP",
  "maxItems": 100
}

Get specific dataset details:

{
  "mode": "getDatasetDetail",
  "datasetIds": ["tracking-climate-models"],
  "maxItems": 10
}

List all NASA organizations:

{
  "mode": "listOrganizations",
  "maxItems": 200
}

Output

Dataset record

{
  "datasetId": "296fce57-6171-425e-ae6d-ba0830e27a26",
  "datasetSlug": "islscp-ii-climate-research-unit-cru05-monthly-climate-data-d1e5f",
  "title": "ISLSCP II Climate Research Unit CRU05 Monthly Climate Data",
  "description": "This data set contains a mean monthly climatology for several climate variables...",
  "organizationName": "nasa",
  "organizationTitle": "NASA",
  "maintainer": "Earthdata Forum",
  "maintainerEmail": "earthdata-support@nasa.gov",
  "tags": ["earth-science-atmospheric-temperature", "earth-science-precipitation"],
  "resources": [
    {
      "name": "Dataset Download",
      "format": "ZIP",
      "url": "https://data.ornldaac.earthdata.nasa.gov/...",
      "created": "2025-08-21T18:27:40.671929"
    }
  ],
  "licenseTitle": "other-license-specified",
  "isOpen": false,
  "metadataCreated": "2025-04-01T16:43:52.479370",
  "metadataModified": "2026-05-18T19:57:44.199238",
  "numResources": 7,
  "numTags": 5,
  "sourceUrl": "https://data.nasa.gov/dataset/296fce57-6171-425e-ae6d-ba0830e27a26",
  "scrapedAt": "2026-05-30T08:30:00+00:00",
  "recordType": "dataset"
}

Organization record

{
  "orgName": "nasa",
  "orgTitle": "NASA",
  "orgDescription": "NASA's vision: To reach for new heights and reveal the unknown...",
  "memberCount": 0,
  "packageCount": 40000,
  "sourceUrl": "https://data.nasa.gov/organization/nasa",
  "scrapedAt": "2026-05-30T08:30:00+00:00",
  "recordType": "organization"
}

FAQ

Do I need an API key? No. NASA's Open Data Portal CKAN API is fully open and does not require authentication.

How many datasets are available? Over 40,000 NASA datasets covering Earth science, space exploration, aeronautics, climate research, and more.

Can I filter by file format? Yes. Use the format field to filter by CSV, JSON, ZIP, PDF, GeoJSON, and more.

Can I search by NASA organization? Yes. Use the organization field with nasa as the slug.

What's the difference between searchDatasets and getDatasetDetail? searchDatasets performs keyword search and returns many results. getDatasetDetail fetches complete metadata for specific datasets by their ID or slug.

Why are some fields missing from output? Only fields with actual data are included. No null or blank values are emitted.

Can I get datasets sorted by date? Yes. Set sortBy to metadata_modified desc for recently updated datasets or metadata_created desc for newest additions.

What science topics are covered? NASA's portal includes data from Earth science, space physics, planetary science, astrophysics, aeronautics, human spaceflight, and climate research programs.