fred_browse

Browse and navigate through FRED’s hierarchical catalog structure to discover available economic data series.

Overview

The fred_browse tool provides systematic navigation through FRED’s extensive catalog of over 800,000 economic time series. Use it to:

Explore economic categories and subcategories
Browse data releases from various sources
List all series within a specific category or release
Discover data sources and their available series

Parameters

string

required

Type of browsing operation to perform.Options:

categories: Browse category tree
releases: List data releases
sources: List data sources
category_series: Get all series in a category
release_series: Get all series in a release

number

Category ID for browsing subcategories or series.Required when:

browse_type is category_series

Optional when:

browse_type is categories (omit to get root categories)

Common IDs:

32991: Money, Banking & Finance
10: Population, Employment & Labor Markets
1: Production & Business Activity
32992: Prices
3008: U.S. Regional Data
32264: International Data

number

Release ID for browsing series within a release.Required when:

browse_type is release_series

Popular Release IDs:

53: GDP
50: Employment Situation
10: Consumer Price Index
15: Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization
18: Federal Reserve Economic Data

number

default:"50"

Maximum number of results to return (1-1000).

number

default:"0"

Number of results to skip for pagination.

string

Field to order results by.Options vary by browse_type:

Categories: name, series_count
Series: series_id, title, popularity, last_updated
Releases: name, release_id, press_release

string

default:"asc"

Sort order for results.Options:

asc: Ascending order
desc: Descending order

Examples

Browse Root Categories

{
  "tool": "fred_browse",
  "params": {
    "browse_type": "categories"
  }
}

{
  "categories": [
    {
      "id": 32991,
      "name": "Money, Banking, & Finance",
      "parent_id": 0,
      "series_count": 48000
    },
    {
      "id": 10,
      "name": "Population, Employment, & Labor Markets",
      "parent_id": 0,
      "series_count": 84000
    },
    {
      "id": 1,
      "name": "Production & Business Activity",
      "parent_id": 0,
      "series_count": 52000
    }
  ],
  "metadata": {
    "count": 8,
    "total": 8
  }
}

Browse Subcategories

{
  "tool": "fred_browse",
  "params": {
    "browse_type": "categories",
    "category_id": 32991
  }
}

{
  "categories": [
    {
      "id": 22,
      "name": "Interest Rates",
      "parent_id": 32991,
      "series_count": 12000
    },
    {
      "id": 24,
      "name": "Exchange Rates",
      "parent_id": 32991,
      "series_count": 3500
    },
    {
      "id": 46,
      "name": "Banking",
      "parent_id": 32991,
      "series_count": 8000
    }
  ]
}

Get Series in a Category

{
  "tool": "fred_browse",
  "params": {
    "browse_type": "category_series",
    "category_id": 22,
    "limit": 5,
    "order_by": "popularity",
    "sort_order": "desc"
  }
}

{
  "series": [
    {
      "id": "DGS10",
      "title": "Market Yield on U.S. Treasury Securities at 10-Year Constant Maturity",
      "observation_start": "1962-01-02",
      "observation_end": "2024-12-31",
      "frequency": "Daily",
      "units": "Percent",
      "seasonal_adjustment": "Not Seasonally Adjusted",
      "popularity": 95
    },
    {
      "id": "DFF",
      "title": "Federal Funds Effective Rate",
      "observation_start": "1954-07-01",
      "observation_end": "2024-12-31",
      "frequency": "Daily",
      "units": "Percent",
      "seasonal_adjustment": "Not Seasonally Adjusted",
      "popularity": 93
    }
  ],
  "metadata": {
    "count": 5,
    "offset": 0,
    "limit": 5,
    "total": 12000
  }
}

Browse Data Releases

{
  "tool": "fred_browse",
  "params": {
    "browse_type": "releases",
    "limit": 10,
    "order_by": "name"
  }
}

{
  "releases": [
    {
      "id": 10,
      "name": "Consumer Price Index",
      "press_release": true,
      "link": "https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm",
      "source": "U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics"
    },
    {
      "id": 50,
      "name": "Employment Situation",
      "press_release": true,
      "link": "https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm",
      "source": "U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics"
    },
    {
      "id": 53,
      "name": "Gross Domestic Product",
      "press_release": true,
      "link": "https://www.bea.gov/news/current-releases",
      "source": "U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis"
    }
  ],
  "metadata": {
    "count": 10,
    "total": 300
  }
}

Browse Data Sources

{
  "tool": "fred_browse",
  "params": {
    "browse_type": "sources",
    "limit": 5
  }
}

{
  "sources": [
    {
      "id": 1,
      "name": "Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (US)",
      "link": "https://www.federalreserve.gov/",
      "series_count": 45000
    },
    {
      "id": 2,
      "name": "U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics",
      "link": "https://www.bls.gov/",
      "series_count": 75000
    },
    {
      "id": 3,
      "name": "U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis",
      "link": "https://www.bea.gov/",
      "series_count": 35000
    }
  ],
  "metadata": {
    "count": 5,
    "total": 89
  }
}

Hierarchical Exploration

Start with Root Categories

{
  "browse_type": "categories"
}

Drill Down to Subcategories

{
  "browse_type": "categories",
  "category_id": 32991
}

List Series in Category

{
  "browse_type": "category_series",
  "category_id": 22,
  "order_by": "popularity"
}

Retrieve Specific Series

Use fred_get_series with the discovered series ID

Release-Based Discovery

List All Releases

{
  "browse_type": "releases",
  "order_by": "name"
}

Get Series in Release

{
  "browse_type": "release_series",
  "release_id": 10
}

Filter and Retrieve

Use series IDs with fred_get_series

Common Use Cases

Finding Interest Rate Data

// Step 1: Navigate to Money & Banking
{
  "browse_type": "categories",
  "category_id": 32991
}

// Step 2: Find Interest Rates category (ID: 22)
{
  "browse_type": "category_series",
  "category_id": 22,
  "order_by": "popularity",
  "limit": 20
}

Exploring Regional Data

// Step 1: Go to U.S. Regional Data
{
  "browse_type": "categories",
  "category_id": 3008
}

// Step 2: Browse states
{
  "browse_type": "categories",
  "category_id": 27281  // States category
}

// Step 3: Get California data
{
  "browse_type": "category_series",
  "category_id": 27286  // California
}

Finding Latest Economic Releases

// Get recent releases
{
  "browse_type": "releases",
  "order_by": "release_id",
  "sort_order": "desc",
  "limit": 10
}

Category Reference

Top-Level Categories

ID	Name	Description	Series Count
32991	Money, Banking & Finance	Financial markets, interest rates, exchange rates	~48,000
10	Population, Employment & Labor Markets	Jobs, unemployment, demographics	~84,000
1	Production & Business Activity	GDP, industrial production, business indicators	~52,000
32992	Prices	Inflation, CPI, PPI, commodity prices	~32,000
3008	U.S. Regional Data	State and metro area statistics	~350,000
32264	International Data	Global economic indicators	~150,000
32263	Academic Data	Research datasets from universities	~15,000

Popular Subcategories

Parent	ID	Name	Key Series
32991	22	Interest Rates	DFF, DGS10, DGS2, TB3MS
32991	24	Exchange Rates	DEXUSEU, DEXJPUS, DEXCHUS
10	12	Unemployment Rate	UNRATE, U6RATE, CIVPART
1	18	GDP	GDP, GDPC1, GDPPOT
32992	9	Consumer Price Indexes	CPIAUCSL, CPILFESL

Error Handling

Common Errors

Error	Cause	Solution
`Invalid browse_type`	Unknown browse_type value	Use one of: categories, releases, sources, category_series, release_series
`category_id required`	Missing required parameter	Provide category_id when browse_type is category_series
`release_id required`	Missing required parameter	Provide release_id when browse_type is release_series
`Invalid category_id`	Category doesn’t exist	Verify category_id or browse to find correct ID

Best Practices

Tips for Efficient Browsing:

Start broad and narrow down systematically
Use popularity ordering to find commonly-used series
Plan navigation path to minimize API calls
Combine with fred_search for targeted discovery

fred_search

Search for specific series by keywords

fred_get_series

Retrieve data for discovered series

API Tools

fred_browse

fred_browse

Overview

Parameters

Examples

Browse Root Categories

Browse Subcategories

Get Series in a Category

Browse Data Releases

Browse Data Sources

Navigation Strategies

Hierarchical Exploration

Release-Based Discovery

Common Use Cases

Finding Interest Rate Data

Exploring Regional Data

Finding Latest Economic Releases

Category Reference

Top-Level Categories

Popular Subcategories

Error Handling

Common Errors

Best Practices

fred_search

fred_get_series

​fred_browse

​Overview

​Parameters

​Examples

​Browse Root Categories

​Browse Subcategories

​Get Series in a Category

​Browse Data Releases

​Browse Data Sources

​Navigation Strategies

​Hierarchical Exploration

​Release-Based Discovery

​Common Use Cases

​Finding Interest Rate Data

​Exploring Regional Data

​Finding Latest Economic Releases

​Category Reference

​Top-Level Categories

​Popular Subcategories

​Error Handling

​Common Errors

​Best Practices

​Related Tools

fred_search

fred_get_series

fred_browse

Overview

Parameters

Examples

Browse Root Categories

Browse Subcategories

Get Series in a Category

Browse Data Releases

Browse Data Sources

Navigation Strategies

Hierarchical Exploration

Release-Based Discovery

Common Use Cases

Finding Interest Rate Data

Exploring Regional Data

Finding Latest Economic Releases

Category Reference

Top-Level Categories

Popular Subcategories

Error Handling

Common Errors

Best Practices

Related Tools