FPL API from JavaScript

Why the FPL API fails in the browser

The Fantasy Premier League API is the JSON the FPL website loads from https://fantasy.premierleague.com/api/. None of the endpoints we tested sends Access-Control-Allow-Origin, so the browser hides the response and fetch() rejects with a blocked by CORS policy error. Python, curl and Postman work because only browsers enforce CORS.

Through https://proxy.cors.dev/ the same response comes back with the header. FPL compresses its JSON with gzip, but the free 1 MiB limit counts the decoded body: bootstrap-static is 169 KB on the wire and 1,783,651 bytes decoded, so the free tier returns 502 with X-Cors-Error: response_too_large. Every other public endpoint in the table below is under 500 KB.

A mini-league table on the free tier

Classic league standings come 50 managers per page from /api/leagues-classic/{league}/standings/, about 11 KB per page. The league id is the number in the standings address, such as fantasy.premierleague.com/leagues/314/standings/c; 314 is the Overall league.

// Markup: <h2 id="league-name"></h2><ol id="league-table"></ol>
// Replace 314, the Overall league, with the id from your league's standings URL
const leagueId = 314;

async function fpl(path) {
  const response = await fetch('https://proxy.cors.dev/https://fantasy.premierleague.com/api' + path, {
    credentials: 'omit',
  });
  if (!response.ok) {
    throw new Error(`FPL request failed: ${response.headers.get('X-Cors-Error') ?? response.status}`);
  }
  return response.json();
}

const heading = document.querySelector('#league-name');
const table = document.querySelector('#league-table');
Promise.all([fpl('/events/'), fpl(`/leagues-classic/${leagueId}/standings/`)])
  .then(([events, { league, standings }]) => {
    const current = events.find((event) => event.is_current);
    heading.textContent = `${league.name}, ${current?.name ?? 'pre-season'}`;
    table.replaceChildren(
      ...standings.results.map((row) => {
        const item = document.createElement('li');
        item.textContent = `${row.entry_name} (${row.player_name}): ${row.total} points, ${row.event_total} this gameweek`;
        return item;
      }),
    );
  })
  .catch((error) => {
    table.textContent = error.message;
  });

standings.has_next is true when another page exists; request it with ?page_standings=2. /api/events/ is 28 KB and marks the current gameweek with is_current, so you never need bootstrap-static just to know which gameweek it is.

Live gameweek points

/api/event/{gw}/live/ returns every player's stats for one gameweek, 472 KB for all 668 players in gameweek 7, with stats.total_points, minutes, goals, assists, bonus and expected goals. /api/entry/{team}/event/{gw}/picks/ returns a manager's 15 picks, each with a multiplier: without a chip, 2 for the captain, 1 for the rest of the starting 11 and 0 on the bench.

Sum each pick's total_points times its multiplier for a live score; FPL's own figure is entry_history.points in the picks response. Picks for a gameweek appear only after its deadline: gameweek 8 picks returned 404 before the October 23 deadline.

Every player and price from bootstrap-static

bootstrap-static is the file every FPL tool starts from: 668 players with prices, points, ownership and status, the 20 clubs, all 38 gameweeks, positions and game settings. At 1.7 MiB it is over the free limit, and so is /api/elements/ at 1.66 MiB.

Pro relays responses up to 6 MiB for $5/month and 500,000 requests per billing period; the 7-day trial includes 1,000 requests and needs no card. Requests carry an origin-locked publishable key in the X-Cors-Key header, which cors.dev never sends to FPL.

// YOUR_CONNECTION_KEY is the publishable key of a Connection that allows your origin and fantasy.premierleague.com
const response = await fetch('https://proxy.cors.dev/https://fantasy.premierleague.com/api/bootstrap-static/', {
  headers: { 'X-Cors-Key': 'YOUR_CONNECTION_KEY' },
  credentials: 'omit',
});
if (!response.ok) {
  throw new Error(`FPL request failed: ${response.headers.get('X-Cors-Error') ?? response.status}`);
}
const { elements, teams, element_types: positions, events } = await response.json();

const club = new Map(teams.map((team) => [team.id, team.short_name]));
const position = new Map(positions.map((type) => [type.id, type.singular_name_short]));
const current = events.find((event) => event.is_current);

console.log(`${elements.length} players, ${current?.name ?? 'pre-season'}`);
console.table(
  [...elements]
    .sort((a, b) => b.total_points - a.total_points)
    .slice(0, 10)
    .map((player) => ({
      name: player.web_name,
      club: club.get(player.team),
      position: position.get(player.element_type),
      price: `£${(player.now_cost / 10).toFixed(1)}m`,
      points: player.total_points,
      selected: `${player.selected_by_percent}%`,
    })),
);

now_cost is in tenths of a million pounds, so Haaland's 157 is £15.7m, and element_type 1 to 4 maps to GKP, DEF, MID and FWD through element_types. Add X-Cors-Cache: 300 to cache the file for 5 minutes instead of downloading 1.7 MiB on every page view. The teams entries are not a league table: their played, win and points fields were all 0 in October 2026. For the real Premier League table, ESPN's soccer/eng.1 standings work directly; see ESPN API from JavaScript.

FPL API endpoints and response sizes

Paths are relative to https://fantasy.premierleague.com/api/, and the trailing slash is optional. Manager 1 and league 314 are public examples; swap in your own ids.

The 2026/27 season and API changes

/api/events/ lists 38 gameweeks for 2026/27, from a gameweek 1 deadline on August 21, 2026 to gameweek 38 on May 30, 2027. On October 18, 2026, gameweek 7 was current, gameweek 8 had a deadline of October 23 at 18:30 UK time, and bootstrap-static counted 11,124,702 managers.

The API is unofficial and undocumented, and paths change between seasons: older paths such as /api/bootstrap-dynamic/ and /api/leagues-classic-standings/314 now return 404. Check response.ok, show the error, and re-test your endpoints when a new season opens in the summer.

Limits

• Free tier: GET and HEAD, JSON and other text responses up to 1 MiB decoded, a 10 second upstream deadline and 600 requests per minute per client IP, with no daily or monthly quota. No signup and no key.
• Size: bootstrap-static and /api/elements/ are the only endpoints we found over 1 MiB. A full gameweek of live stats is 472 KB and works free.
• Login: endpoints for your own team, such as /api/my-team/{team}/, need an FPL login and return 403 without one. Nothing else on this page needs a login, key or cookie.
• Pro: $5/month for 500,000 requests per billing period, responses up to 6 MiB, 600 requests per minute and 10 concurrent per account, and opt-in caching of 1 to 300 seconds with X-Cors-Cache.

Good questions.