Dictionaries · head-to-head
Oxford vs Wordnik
Oxford Dictionaries API (Oxford Languages) exposes definitions, translations, and lexical metadata sourced from Oxford University Press's own databases across dozens of languages, authenticated with an app ID/key pair from its developer portal. New accounts start on a free Sandbox tier that emulates the live API for evaluation before moving to paid production plans, with custom Enterprise licensing available from an annual per-language fee.
Wordnik's REST API returns word definitions aggregated from multiple published dictionaries alongside example sentences, pronunciations, related words, and corpus-derived frequency data, documented through an interactive Swagger UI. Every developer gets a free Basic plan (100 calls/hour, with an explicit nonprofit/research allowance) before paid Hobby, Pro, and Enterprise tiers raise the ceiling up to 45,000 calls/hour -- revenue that funds Wordnik's nonprofit mission to document the English language.
| Oxford | Wordnik | |
|---|---|---|
| Authentication | API Key | API Key |
| Pricing | freemium | freemium |
| Formats | JSON | JSON |
| CORS | no | yes |
| HTTPS | Yes | Yes |
Wordnik supports CORS, while Oxford doesn't — pick Wordnik for direct browser calls.