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Entry by Word

Look up a dictionary entry using the word string directly, instead of a numeric ID. This is useful when you know the exact word you want to retrieve.

GET /api/v1/entry/{source}/word/{word}

Path Parameters

ParameterTypeDescription
sourcestringThe dictionary ID to search in.
wordstringThe word to look up. Must be URL-encoded for non-ASCII characters.

URL Encoding

URL Encoding Requirement

For non-Latin scripts (Bengali, Arabic, Japanese, etc.), the word parameter must be properly URL-encoded. Most HTTP clients handle this automatically.

# Looking up the Bengali word "ধন্যবাদ" (thank you)
curl -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  "https://api.shobdo.me/api/v1/entry/DICTIONARY_ID/word/%E0%A6%A7%E0%A6%A8%E0%A7%8D%E0%A6%AF%E0%A6%AC%E0%A6%BE%E0%A6%A6"
 
# Most clients handle encoding automatically:
# Python: requests.get(f".../word/{word}")
# JS: fetch(`/api/v1/entry/{source}/word/${encodeURIComponent(word)}`)

Example Request

curl -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  "https://api.shobdo.me/api/v1/entry/DICTIONARY_ID/word/hello"

Example Response

The response format is identical to the Entry by ID endpoint.

{
  "ok": true,
  "data": {
    "id": "42",
    "word": "hello",
    "htmlContent": "<div class=\"shobdo-entry\">...</div>",
    "plainText": "Used as a greeting...",
    "sourceLang": "en",
    "targetLang": null,
    "dictionaryId": "...",
    "dictionaryName": "...",
    "hasAudio": true,
    "audioUrl": "https://..."
  }
}

Differences from Entry by ID

Lookup Key

Entry by ID: Numeric entry ID Entry by Word: Exact word string

Use Case

Entry by ID: Retrieving a specific known entry from search results Entry by Word: Quick lookup when you already know the word

Homographs

Entry by ID: Returns the specific entry for the given ID Entry by Word: Returns the first matching entry (lemma form)

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