Shopping overview

The Shopping API provides you with access to live rates and availability for rental car vendors

Overview

The Shopping API returns rates and availability for up to 200 cars per request at specified geographic or airport locations. It supports flexible pickup and drop-off configurations, allowing different times and locations for each.

The response includes information about the car, vendor, location, and rate with a complete price breakdown to meet market-specific display requirements. Additionally, the API provides comprehensive car details including passenger capacity, luggage capacity, number of doors, and mileage information, with a complete price breakdown to meet market-specific display requirements.

Pricing and payments

The Shopping API provides a detailed breakdown of rental costs, including various types of rental fees, rate details, total cost, optional extras, and the amount due at the time of booking. The response also includes a list of applicable policies and links to make payment registration and car booking requests.

Variable taxes and fees

There may be mandatory taxes and fees that are not included in the total price because they cannot be calculated at the time of booking. For example, if the vehicle is not returned with the same amount of fuel as at the beginning of the rental period, refueling charges may be applied.

Important

We have updated our APIs to enable you to display pricing in a variety of ways. Ultimately, it’s your responsibility to ensure that the way you display Expedia travel information and pricing complies with the law.

Strikethrough pricing

If you want to display discounts or special rates using a strikethrough, we offer two options:

daily_rate_strikethrough: Provides the total price, excluding taxes, before any discounts are applied. This field should be used in locales that typically show the base price without taxes and fees on search results, such as the United States.
inclusive_strikethrough: Presents the total price, before discounts, with taxes and fees included. This field is designed to allow you to more clearly display how the discount applies to the total rental amount. The field returns a value in both the billable and requested currencies.

Example

{
  "value": [
    {
      "car_rental_id": "AQ_PvCPCWLLZGzhRf4YeMM1md7xEb41ZEhUz6ns4tIn6Nv-m9LtrUYMhZ4F_a0Xkqu2rGXht4g0Zd53gL4e9yMh0fMVtqe0jKkaZKaBghFVtc",
      "vendor": {…},
      "locations": {
        "pickup": {…},
        "dropoff": {…},
      "description": "Nissan Rogue or similar",
      "number_of_passengers": 5,
      "number_of_doors": {…},
      "acriss_code": "CEBD",
      "mileage_tracking": "First 100 miles free per day, then $0.25 per mile.",
      "luggage_count": {…},
      "image": {…},
      "rate": {
        "merchant_of_record": "vendor",
        "sale_scenario": {…},
        "pricing": {
          "daily_rate_strikethrough": {…},
          "daily_rate": {…},
          "totals": {
            "inclusive_strikethrough": {
              "billable_currency": {
                "value": "47.44",
                "currency": "USD"
              },
              "request_currency": {
                "value": "47.44",
                "currency": "USD"
              }
            },
            "inclusive": {…},
            "exclusive": {…},
            "fees": {…},
            "due_at_booking": {…}
          }
        }
      },
      "cancel_penalties": [{…}],
      "links": {…}
    }
  ]
}

Promotion and discount price display

Some points of sale require details of the standard rate price—the price on which the discount is calculated—when displaying a discounted total based on a promotion or a strikethrough price provided in the Availability and Details responses. Be sure to check what information is required in the area you’re planning to do business.

Refundability options

The cancel_penalties field lets you display cancellation options that offer your travelers rate transparency and enhanced flexibility.

Rate limiting

Website traffic optimization is achieved by applying rate limits to ensure the continued delivery of a stable and maintainable service while also guaranteeing the efficient use of Expedia Group systems. For Shopping API traffic, rate limits are currently based on the total volume of requests over time.