Airparser Python API Docs | dltHub

Build a Airparser-to-database pipeline in Python using dlt with AI Workbench support for Claude Code, Cursor, and Codex.

Last updated:

Airparser is a document parsing platform that extracts structured data from PDFs, emails, and other documents via a REST API. The REST API base URL is https://api.airparser.com and All requests require an API key in the X-API-Key header..

dlt is an open-source Python library that handles authentication, pagination, and schema evolution automatically. dlthub provides AI context files that enable code assistants to generate production-ready pipelines. Install with uv pip install "dlt[workspace]" and start loading Airparser data in under 10 minutes.


What data can I load from Airparser?

Here are some of the endpoints you can load from Airparser:

ResourceEndpointMethodData selectorDescription
inboxes/inboxesGETinboxesList all inboxes available to the API key
inbox_docs/inboxes/<inbox_id>/docsGETdocsList documents for an inbox (supports pagination and filters)
docs_extended/docs/<document_id>/extendedGETRetrieve parsed document JSON (extended parsed data)
upload/inboxes/<inbox_id>/uploadPOSTUpload a document file for parsing (multipart/form-data)
schema/inboxes/<inbox_id>/schemaPOSTCreate or update extraction schema for an inbox
schema_clone/inboxes/<inbox_id>/schema-clonePOSTClone extraction schema between inboxes

How do I authenticate with the Airparser API?

Airparser uses an API key. Include the API key value in the X-API-Key HTTP header on every request (e.g., X-API-Key: <YOUR_API_KEY>). Unauthenticated requests return HTTP 401.

1. Get your credentials

  1. Sign in to your Airparser account at https://app.airparser.com (or sign up at https://app.airparser.com/signup). 2) Navigate to Account → API key (or the API key section on the account page). 3) Copy the displayed API key and store it securely; use it in the X-API-Key header for API calls.

2. Add them to .dlt/secrets.toml

[sources.airparser_source] api_key = "your_api_key_here"

dlt reads this automatically at runtime — never hardcode tokens in your pipeline script. For production environments, see setting up credentials with dlt for environment variable and vault-based options.


How do I set up and run the pipeline?

Set up a virtual environment and install dlt:

uv venv && source .venv/bin/activate uv pip install "dlt[workspace]"

1. Install the dlt AI Workbench:

dlt ai init --agent <your-agent> # <agent>: claude | cursor | codex

This installs project rules, a secrets management skill, appropriate ignore files, and configures the dlt MCP server for your agent. Learn more →

2. Install the rest-api-pipeline toolkit:

dlt ai toolkit rest-api-pipeline install

This loads the skills and context about dlt the agent uses to build the pipeline iteratively, efficiently, and safely. The agent uses MCP tools to inspect credentials — it never needs to read your secrets.toml directly. Learn more →

3. Start LLM-assisted coding:

Use /find-source to load data from the Airparser API into DuckDB.

The rest-api-pipeline toolkit takes over from here — it reads relevant API documentation, presents you with options for which endpoints to load, and follows a structured workflow to scaffold, debug, and validate the pipeline step by step.

4. Run the pipeline:

python airparser_pipeline.py

If everything is configured correctly, you'll see output like this:

Pipeline airparser_pipeline load step completed in 0.26 seconds 1 load package(s) were loaded to destination duckdb and into dataset airparser_data The duckdb destination used duckdb:/airparser.duckdb location to store data Load package 1749667187.541553 is LOADED and contains no failed jobs

Inspect your pipeline and data:

dlt pipeline airparser_pipeline show

This opens the Pipeline Dashboard where you can verify pipeline state, load metrics, schema (tables, columns, types), and query the loaded data directly.


Python pipeline example

This example loads inboxes and docs from the Airparser API into DuckDB. It mirrors the endpoint and data selector configuration from the table above:

import dlt from dlt.sources.rest_api import RESTAPIConfig, rest_api_resources @dlt.source def airparser_source(api_key=dlt.secrets.value): config: RESTAPIConfig = { "client": { "base_url": "https://api.airparser.com", "auth": { "type": "api_key", "api_key": api_key, }, }, "resources": [ {"name": "inboxes", "endpoint": {"path": "inboxes", "data_selector": "inboxes"}}, {"name": "inbox_docs", "endpoint": {"path": "inboxes/<inbox_id>/docs", "data_selector": "docs"}} ], } yield from rest_api_resources(config) def get_data() -> None: pipeline = dlt.pipeline( pipeline_name="airparser_pipeline", destination="duckdb", dataset_name="airparser_data", ) load_info = pipeline.run(airparser_source()) print(load_info)

To add more endpoints, append entries from the resource table to the "resources" list using the same name, path, and data_selector pattern.


How do I query the loaded data?

Once the pipeline runs, dlt creates one table per resource. You can query with Python or SQL.

Python (pandas DataFrame):

import dlt data = dlt.pipeline("airparser_pipeline").dataset() sessions_df = data.inbox_docs.df() print(sessions_df.head())

SQL (DuckDB example):

SELECT * FROM airparser_data.inbox_docs LIMIT 10;

In a marimo or Jupyter notebook:

import dlt data = dlt.pipeline("airparser_pipeline").dataset() data.inbox_docs.df().head()

See how to explore your data in marimo Notebooks and how to query your data in Python with dataset.


What destinations can I load Airparser data to?

dlt supports loading into any of these destinations — only the destination parameter changes:

DestinationExample value
DuckDB (local, default)"duckdb"
PostgreSQL"postgres"
BigQuery"bigquery"
Snowflake"snowflake"
Redshift"redshift"
Databricks"databricks"
Filesystem (S3, GCS, Azure)"filesystem"

Change the destination in dlt.pipeline(destination="snowflake") and add credentials in .dlt/secrets.toml. See the full destinations list.


Troubleshooting

Authentication failures

If you receive HTTP 401 Unauthorized, verify that the X-API-Key header contains a valid API key, without extra whitespace, and that the key has not been revoked.

Rate limits and throttling

The public documentation does not publish explicit rate limits. If you encounter HTTP 429 responses, implement exponential backoff and retry with increasing delays.

Pagination and filters for /inboxes/<inbox_id>/docs

The documents list endpoint supports page, from, to, q, and statuses query parameters. Use page to iterate through results; continue requesting subsequent pages until the response returns no additional documents.

Ensure that the API key is valid to avoid 401 Unauthorized errors. Also, verify endpoint paths and parameters to avoid 404 Not Found errors.


Next steps

Continue your data engineering journey with the other toolkits of the dltHub AI Workbench:

  • data-exploration — Build custom notebooks, charts, and dashboards for deeper analysis with marimo notebooks.
  • dlthub-runtime — Deploy, schedule, and monitor your pipeline in production.
dlt ai toolkit data-exploration install dlt ai toolkit dlthub-runtime install

Was this page helpful?

Community Hub

Need more dlt context for Airparser?

Request dlt skills, commands, AGENT.md files, and AI-native context.