Anthropic TypeScript API Library

This library provides convenient access to the Anthropic REST API from server-side TypeScript or JavaScript.

The REST API documentation can be found on docs.anthropic.com. The full API of this library can be found in api.md.

Installation

npm install @anthropic-ai/sdk

Usage

The full API of this library can be found in api.md.

import Anthropic from '@anthropic-ai/sdk';

const anthropic = new Anthropic({
  apiKey: process.env['ANTHROPIC_API_KEY'], // This is the default and can be omitted
});

async function main() {
  const message = await anthropic.messages.create({
    max_tokens: 1024,
    messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }],
    model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229',
  });

  console.log(message.content);
}

main();

Streaming Responses

We provide support for streaming responses using Server Sent Events (SSE).

import Anthropic from '@anthropic-ai/sdk';

const anthropic = new Anthropic();

const stream = await anthropic.messages.create({
  max_tokens: 1024,
  messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }],
  model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229',
  stream: true,
});
for await (const messageStreamEvent of stream) {
  console.log(messageStreamEvent.type);
}

If you need to cancel a stream, you can break from the loop or call stream.controller.abort().

Request & Response types

This library includes TypeScript definitions for all request params and response fields. You may import and use them like so:

import Anthropic from '@anthropic-ai/sdk';

const anthropic = new Anthropic({
  apiKey: process.env['ANTHROPIC_API_KEY'], // This is the default and can be omitted
});

async function main() {
  const params: Anthropic.MessageCreateParams = {
    max_tokens: 1024,
    messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }],
    model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229',
  };
  const message: Anthropic.Message = await anthropic.messages.create(params);
}

main();

Documentation for each method, request param, and response field are available in docstrings and will appear on hover in most modern editors.

Counting Tokens

You can see the exact usage for a given request through the usage response property, e.g.

const message = await client.messages.create(...)
console.log(message.usage)
// { input_tokens: 25, output_tokens: 13 }

Streaming Helpers

This library provides several conveniences for streaming messages, for example:

import Anthropic from '@anthropic-ai/sdk';

const anthropic = new Anthropic();

async function main() {
  const stream = anthropic.messages
    .stream({
      model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229',
      max_tokens: 1024,
      messages: [
        {
          role: 'user',
          content: 'Say hello there!',
        },
      ],
    })
    .on('text', (text) => {
      console.log(text);
    });

  const message = await stream.finalMessage();
  console.log(message);
}

main();

Streaming with client.messages.stream(...) exposes various helpers for your convenience including event handlers and accumulation.

Alternatively, you can use client.messages.create({ ..., stream: true }) which only returns an async iterable of the events in the stream and thus uses less memory (it does not build up a final message object for you).

AWS Bedrock

We provide support for the Anthropic Bedrock API through a separate package.

Handling errors

When the library is unable to connect to the API, or if the API returns a non-success status code (i.e., 4xx or 5xx response), a subclass of APIError will be thrown:

async function main() {
  const message = await anthropic.messages
    .create({
      max_tokens: 1024,
      messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }],
      model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229',
    })
    .catch(async (err) => {
      if (err instanceof Anthropic.APIError) {
        console.log(err.status); // 400
        console.log(err.name); // BadRequestError
        console.log(err.headers); // {server: 'nginx', ...}
      } else {
        throw err;
      }
    });
}

main();

Error codes are as followed:

Status Code	Error Type
400	BadRequestError
401	AuthenticationError
403	PermissionDeniedError
404	NotFoundError
422	UnprocessableEntityError
429	RateLimitError
>=500	InternalServerError
N/A	APIConnectionError

Retries

Certain errors will be automatically retried 2 times by default, with a short exponential backoff. Connection errors (for example, due to a network connectivity problem), 408 Request Timeout, 409 Conflict, 429 Rate Limit, and >=500 Internal errors will all be retried by default.

You can use the maxRetries option to configure or disable this:

// Configure the default for all requests:
const anthropic = new Anthropic({
  maxRetries: 0, // default is 2
});

// Or, configure per-request:
await anthropic.messages.create({ max_tokens: 1024, messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }], model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229' }, {
  maxRetries: 5,
});

Timeouts

Requests time out after 10 minutes by default. You can configure this with a timeout option:

// Configure the default for all requests:
const anthropic = new Anthropic({
  timeout: 20 * 1000, // 20 seconds (default is 10 minutes)
});

// Override per-request:
await anthropic.messages.create({ max_tokens: 1024, messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }], model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229' }, {
  timeout: 5 * 1000,
});

On timeout, an APIConnectionTimeoutError is thrown.

Note that requests which time out will be retried twice by default.

Default Headers

We automatically send the anthropic-version header set to 2023-06-01.

If you need to, you can override it by setting default headers on a per-request basis.

Be aware that doing so may result in incorrect types and other unexpected or undefined behavior in the SDK.

import Anthropic from '@anthropic-ai/sdk';

const anthropic = new Anthropic();

const message = await anthropic.messages.create(
  {
    max_tokens: 1024,
    messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }],
    model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229',
  },
  { headers: { 'anthropic-version': 'My-Custom-Value' } },
);

Advanced Usage

Accessing raw Response data (e.g., headers)

The "raw" Response returned by fetch() can be accessed through the .asResponse() method on the APIPromise type that all methods return.

You can also use the .withResponse() method to get the raw Response along with the parsed data.

const anthropic = new Anthropic();

const response = await anthropic.messages
  .create({
    max_tokens: 1024,
    messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }],
    model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229',
  })
  .asResponse();
console.log(response.headers.get('X-My-Header'));
console.log(response.statusText); // access the underlying Response object

const { data: message, response: raw } = await anthropic.messages
  .create({
    max_tokens: 1024,
    messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }],
    model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229',
  })
  .withResponse();
console.log(raw.headers.get('X-My-Header'));
console.log(message.content);

Customizing the fetch client

By default, this library uses node-fetch in Node, and expects a global fetch function in other environments.

If you would prefer to use a global, web-standards-compliant fetch function even in a Node environment, (for example, if you are running Node with --experimental-fetch or using NextJS which polyfills with undici), add the following import before your first import from "Anthropic":

// Tell TypeScript and the package to use the global web fetch instead of node-fetch.
// Note, despite the name, this does not add any polyfills, but expects them to be provided if needed.
import '@anthropic-ai/sdk/shims/web';
import Anthropic from '@anthropic-ai/sdk';

To do the inverse, add import "@anthropic-ai/sdk/shims/node" (which does import polyfills). This can also be useful if you are getting the wrong TypeScript types for Response (more details).

You may also provide a custom fetch function when instantiating the client, which can be used to inspect or alter the Request or Response before/after each request:

import { fetch } from 'undici'; // as one example
import Anthropic from '@anthropic-ai/sdk';

const client = new Anthropic({
  fetch: async (url: RequestInfo, init?: RequestInit): Promise<Response> => {
    console.log('About to make a request', url, init);
    const response = await fetch(url, init);
    console.log('Got response', response);
    return response;
  },
});

Note that if given a DEBUG=true environment variable, this library will log all requests and responses automatically. This is intended for debugging purposes only and may change in the future without notice.

Configuring an HTTP(S) Agent (e.g., for proxies)

By default, this library uses a stable agent for all http/https requests to reuse TCP connections, eliminating many TCP & TLS handshakes and shaving around 100ms off most requests.

If you would like to disable or customize this behavior, for example to use the API behind a proxy, you can pass an httpAgent which is used for all requests (be they http or https), for example:

import http from 'http';
import { HttpsProxyAgent } from 'https-proxy-agent';

// Configure the default for all requests:
const anthropic = new Anthropic({
  httpAgent: new HttpsProxyAgent(process.env.PROXY_URL),
});

// Override per-request:
await anthropic.messages.create(
  {
    max_tokens: 1024,
    messages: [{ role: 'user', content: 'Hello, Claude' }],
    model: 'claude-3-opus-20240229',
  },
  {
    httpAgent: new http.Agent({ keepAlive: false }),
  },
);

Semantic Versioning

This package generally follows SemVer conventions, though certain backwards-incompatible changes may be released as minor versions:

1. Changes that only affect static types, without breaking runtime behavior.
2. Changes to library internals which are technically public but not intended or documented for external use. (Please open a GitHub issue to let us know if you are relying on such internals).
3. Changes that we do not expect to impact the vast majority of users in practice.

We take backwards-compatibility seriously and work hard to ensure you can rely on a smooth upgrade experience.

We are keen for your feedback; please open an issue with questions, bugs, or suggestions.

Requirements

TypeScript >= 4.5 is supported.

The following runtimes are supported:

• Node.js 18 LTS or later (non-EOL) versions.
• Deno v1.28.0 or higher, using import Anthropic from "npm:@anthropic-ai/sdk".
• Bun 1.0 or later.
• Cloudflare Workers.
• Vercel Edge Runtime.
• Jest 28 or greater with the "node" environment ("jsdom" is not supported at this time).
• Nitro v2.6 or greater.

Note that React Native is not supported at this time.

If you are interested in other runtime environments, please open or upvote an issue on GitHub.