Coin Metrics Python API Docs | dltHub

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

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Coin Metrics API v4 provides blockchain, exchange, and asset data via JSON REST endpoints. The base URL is https://api.coinmetrics.io/v4. An API key is required for access. The REST API base URL is https://api.coinmetrics.io/v4 and All requests require an API key passed as the api_key query parameter..

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 Coin Metrics data in under 10 minutes.


What data can I load from Coin Metrics?

Here are some of the endpoints you can load from Coin Metrics:

ResourceEndpointMethodData selectorDescription
reference_data_assets/reference-data/assetsGETdataList of reference data for assets.
catalog_v2_asset_metrics/catalog-v2/asset-metricsGETdataCatalog of available asset‑metric definitions.
timeseries_asset_metrics/timeseries/asset-metricsGETdataTimeseries data for selected asset metrics.
security_master_assets/security-master/assetsGETdataSecurity Master asset records with pagination tokens.
catalog_assets/catalog/assetsGETdataGeneral catalog of assets.

How do I authenticate with the Coin Metrics API?

Authentication is performed by including an API key as the api_key query parameter on each request.

1. Get your credentials

  1. Go to https://app.coinmetrics.io and sign in with your account.
  2. In the user menu, select API Keys.
  3. Click Create New API Key, give it a name, and set the desired permissions.
  4. Save the generated key; copy it to a safe location.
  5. Use this key as the value for the api_key query parameter in requests.

2. Add them to .dlt/secrets.toml

[sources.coin_metrics_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 Coin Metrics 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 coin_metrics_pipeline.py

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

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

Inspect your pipeline and data:

dlt pipeline coin_metrics_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 timeseries_asset_metrics and reference_data_assets from the Coin Metrics 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 coin_metrics_source(api_key=dlt.secrets.value): config: RESTAPIConfig = { "client": { "base_url": "https://api.coinmetrics.io/v4", "auth": { "type": "api_key", "api_key": api_key, }, }, "resources": [ {"name": "reference_data_assets", "endpoint": {"path": "reference-data/assets", "data_selector": "data"}}, {"name": "timeseries_asset_metrics", "endpoint": {"path": "timeseries/asset-metrics", "data_selector": "data"}} ], } yield from rest_api_resources(config) def get_data() -> None: pipeline = dlt.pipeline( pipeline_name="coin_metrics_pipeline", destination="duckdb", dataset_name="coin_metrics_data", ) load_info = pipeline.run(coin_metrics_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("coin_metrics_pipeline").dataset() sessions_df = data.timeseries_asset_metrics.df() print(sessions_df.head())

SQL (DuckDB example):

SELECT * FROM coin_metrics_data.timeseries_asset_metrics LIMIT 10;

In a marimo or Jupyter notebook:

import dlt data = dlt.pipeline("coin_metrics_pipeline").dataset() data.timeseries_asset_metrics.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 Coin Metrics 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.


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

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