Cloudmersive OCR Python API Docs | dltHub

Cloudmersive OCR API is a service that converts images, PDFs, and photos into machine‑readable text using deep‑learning OCR. The REST API base URL is https://api.cloudmersive.com and All requests require an API Key passed in the ‘Apikey’ 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 Cloudmersive OCR data in under 10 minutes.

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What data can I load from Cloudmersive OCR?

Here are some of the endpoints you can load from Cloudmersive OCR:

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How do I authenticate with the Cloudmersive OCR API?

Include an HTTP header Apikey: <your_api_key> with every request; the value is the API key obtained from your Cloudmersive account.

1. Get your credentials

1. Sign up for a Cloudmersive account at https://cloudmersive.com.
2. Log in and navigate to the Management Portal.
3. Open the “API Keys” section.
4. Click “Create New API Key”, give it a name, and confirm.
5. Copy the generated key – it will be used in the Apikey request header.

2. Add them to .dlt/secrets.toml

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[sources.cloudmersive_ocr_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.

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How do I set up and run the pipeline?

Set up a virtual environment and install dlt:

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

1. Install the dlt AI Workbench:

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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:

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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 Cloudmersive OCR 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:

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python cloudmersive_ocr_pipeline.py

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

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

Inspect your pipeline and data:

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dlt pipeline cloudmersive_ocr_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.

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Python pipeline example

This example loads ocr_image_to_text and ocr_pdf_to_text from the Cloudmersive OCR API into DuckDB. It mirrors the endpoint and data selector configuration from the table above:

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import dlt
from dlt.sources.rest_api import RESTAPIConfig, rest_api_resources

@dlt.source
def cloudmersive_ocr_source(api_key=dlt.secrets.value):
    config: RESTAPIConfig = {
        "client": {
            "base_url": "https://api.cloudmersive.com",
            "auth": {
                "type": "api_key",
                "api_key": api_key,
            },
        },
        "resources": [
            {"name": "ocr_image_to_text", "endpoint": {"path": "ocr/image/toText"}},
            {"name": "ocr_pdf_to_text", "endpoint": {"path": "ocr/pdf/toText"}}
        ],
    }
    yield from rest_api_resources(config)


def get_data() -> None:
    pipeline = dlt.pipeline(
        pipeline_name="cloudmersive_ocr_pipeline",
        destination="duckdb",
        dataset_name="cloudmersive_ocr_data",
    )
    load_info = pipeline.run(cloudmersive_ocr_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.

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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):

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import dlt

data = dlt.pipeline("cloudmersive_ocr_pipeline").dataset()
sessions_df = data.ocr_image_to_text.df()
print(sessions_df.head())

SQL (DuckDB example):

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SELECT * FROM cloudmersive_ocr_data.ocr_image_to_text LIMIT 10;

In a marimo or Jupyter notebook:

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import dlt

data = dlt.pipeline("cloudmersive_ocr_pipeline").dataset()
data.ocr_image_to_text.df().head()

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

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What destinations can I load Cloudmersive OCR data to?

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

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

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Troubleshooting

Authentication Errors

• 401 Unauthorized – Returned when the Apikey header is missing or the key is invalid. Verify that the correct API key is set in secrets.toml and that it is included in every request.

Large PDF Processing

• For PDFs larger than 25 pages the response may include AsyncJobID and AsyncJobStatus. Call the CheckPdfOcrJobStatus endpoint with the given job ID to retrieve results once processing completes.

Rate Limits / Free Tier Restrictions

• Free tier API keys are subject to daily request limits and may require a credit‑card on file. Exceeding limits results in a 429 Too Many Requests response. Upgrade the plan or spread calls over time if you encounter this error.

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

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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.

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dlt ai toolkit data-exploration install
dlt ai toolkit dlthub-runtime install

• How to deploy a pipeline
• How to explore your data in marimo Notebooks
• How to query your data in Python with dataset
• Join the dlt community on Slack