Get Started with the 8bitedge API: A Five-Minute Guide

By the end of this guide you’ll have made your first authenticated API call, confirmed your account and plan details, browsed the game catalog, and pulled a live demand leaderboard — all from your terminal. The only tool you need is curl (and optionally jq for pretty-printing JSON).

Prerequisites

You need an 8bitedge API key to follow along. Keys are provisioned per organization — contact the 8bitedge team to get set up. Your key looks like bit_ab12cd34ef56.<secret> and the full plaintext value is shown only once at provisioning time, so store it somewhere safe immediately.

Store your API key

Export your key and the base URL into shell variables so every subsequent command stays readable:

export BITEDGE_API_KEY="bit_ab12cd34ef56.<secret>"
export BASE="https://api.8bitedge.com/api/v1"

Never hard-code your API key in scripts you commit to version control. Environment variables or a secrets manager are the right home for it.

Verify your key

The GET /api/v1/me endpoint returns your organization, plan limits, key metadata, and current usage. It requires a valid key but no specific scope, making it the perfect health check.

curl -s "https://api.8bitedge.com/api/v1/me" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $BITEDGE_API_KEY" | jq

A successful response looks like this:

{
  "data": {
    "organization": { "id": 1, "name": "Acme Corp", "status": "active" },
    "plan": {
      "slug": "starter",
      "name": "Starter",
      "rate_limit_per_minute": 120,
      "rate_limit_per_day": 20000,
      "monthly_quota": 250000,
      "max_batch_size": 50,
      "max_page_size": 50
    },
    "api_key": {
      "name": "server",
      "last_four": "9f3a",
      "scopes": ["games.read", "consoles.read"]
    },
    "usage": {
      "month": { "used": 1234, "quota": 250000, "resets_in": 1209600 }
    }
  }
}

Check the scopes array to confirm which endpoints your key can access. If you see insufficient_scope errors later, this is the first place to look.

Browse the game catalog

The GET /api/v1/games/titles endpoint returns a paginated list of every enabled game in the catalog. This endpoint requires the games.read scope.

curl -s "https://api.8bitedge.com/api/v1/games/titles" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $BITEDGE_API_KEY" | jq

The response is paginated. By default you get 25 results per page (capped by your plan’s max_page_size):

{
  "data": [
    { "id": 12, "display_game_name": "Aladdin" },
    { "id": 47, "display_game_name": "Battletoads" }
  ],
  "meta": {
    "pagination": {
      "mode": "page",
      "page": 1,
      "per_page": 25,
      "total": 842,
      "last_page": 34
    }
  },
  "links": {
    "next": "https://api.8bitedge.com/api/v1/games/titles?page=2",
    "prev": null
  }
}

Follow links.next to walk through subsequent pages, or fetch a specific game by id to get full pricing details:

curl -s "https://api.8bitedge.com/api/v1/games/game/123" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $BITEDGE_API_KEY" | jq

{
  "data": {
    "id": 123,
    "game_name": "Chrono Trigger",
    "game_slug": "chrono-trigger",
    "console_id": 19,
    "price_loose": "40.00",
    "price_complete": "95.50",
    "price_new": "300.00"
  }
}

Pass ?limit=50 to fetch up to your plan’s max_page_size per request. Always read meta.pagination.per_page in the response — the server silently caps oversized limit values to your plan maximum.

Check the demand leaderboard

The demand leaderboard is where 8bitedge’s market intelligence comes to life. GET /api/v1/demand-intent/games ranks every game by buyer intent over a rolling time window. This endpoint requires the demand-intent.read scope.

curl -s "https://api.8bitedge.com/api/v1/demand-intent/games?period=7d" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $BITEDGE_API_KEY" | jq

Each row in the leaderboard tells you exactly how much buyer interest a game is generating and whether that interest is accelerating:

{
  "data": [
    {
      "rank": 1,
      "game": {
        "id": 412,
        "name": "Chrono Trigger",
        "slug": "chrono-trigger",
        "console_id": 19,
        "console_name": "Nintendo SNES"
      },
      "intent": {
        "redirects": 980,
        "distinct_users": 712,
        "mobile_share": 0.41
      },
      "watch": { "watch_count": 64 },
      "momentum": { "value": 1.4, "label": "rising" },
      "pricing": {
        "loose": "40.00",
        "complete": "95.50",
        "new": "300.00"
      },
      "demand_score": 100
    }
  ],
  "meta": {
    "period": "7d",
    "period_date": "2025-01-15",
    "sort": "intent",
    "pagination": {
      "mode": "page",
      "page": 1,
      "per_page": 25,
      "total": 842,
      "last_page": 34
    }
  }
}

Key fields to understand:

Field	What it tells you
`intent.redirects`	How many buyer clicks this game generated in the period
`intent.distinct_users`	Unique buyers showing interest — reach, not just volume
`watch.watch_count`	Buyers who added this game to a watchlist — latent demand
`momentum.label`	`rising` (≥1.2×), `steady`, or `cooling` (below 0.8×) vs. 30d baseline
`demand_score`	0–100 composite index blending intent, reach, and watch demand

You can sort by watches or momentum instead of the default intent sort:

curl -s "https://api.8bitedge.com/api/v1/demand-intent/games?period=7d&sort=momentum" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $BITEDGE_API_KEY" | jq

Read rate-limit headers

Every response from the 8bitedge API includes rate-limit headers so your integration can stay within plan limits without guessing. Use curl -D - to dump response headers to stdout:

curl -s -D - "$BASE/games/titles" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $BITEDGE_API_KEY" \
  -o /dev/null

Look for these headers in the output:

HTTP/2 200
x-request-id: 5f3c1e2a-...-9b21
x-ratelimit-limit: 120
x-ratelimit-remaining: 117
x-ratelimit-reset: 42

Header	Meaning
`X-RateLimit-Limit`	Your plan’s per-minute request limit
`X-RateLimit-Remaining`	Calls left in the current one-minute window
`X-RateLimit-Reset`	Seconds until the window resets

If you exhaust the window, you’ll receive a 429 with a Retry-After header telling you exactly how many seconds to wait before retrying:

{
  "error": {
    "code": "rate_limit_exceeded",
    "message": "Rate limit exceeded for the minute window.",
    "details": { "window": "minute", "limit": 120 }
  }
}

A note on scopes

Your API key’s scopes array controls which endpoints you can call. Here’s a quick reference for the endpoints in this guide:

Endpoint	Scope required
`GET /api/v1/me`	None (valid key only)
`GET /api/v1/games/*`	`games.read`
`GET /api/v1/consoles*`	`consoles.read`
`GET /api/v1/demand-intent/*`	`demand-intent.read`

If your key is missing a required scope, the API returns 403 insufficient_scope. Check your scopes with GET /api/v1/me and contact the 8bitedge team to have additional scopes added to your key.

Next steps

Authentication

Deep-dive into bearer keys, scopes, and how to handle every auth error code.

Plans & Limits

Understand rate limits, monthly quotas, page size caps, and what happens when you exceed them.

Demand Signals Guide

Learn how to use momentum scores, condition breakdowns, and search analytics to drive sourcing decisions.

Catalog Lookups Guide

Efficiently query the games and consoles catalog — by id, slug, title, or console.

​Prerequisites

​A note on scopes

​Next steps

Authentication

Plans & Limits

Demand Signals Guide

Catalog Lookups Guide

Prerequisites

A note on scopes

Next steps