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Sensors

The Sensors resource in the OpenAQ API provides details about individual air quality sensors that collect environmental data. One or more sensors belong to a Location. Each sensor tracks a single parameter, such as air pollutant measurements or related measurements (e.g., temperature and humidity) and reports on their concentration over time.

Purpose and Use

The Sensors resource allows users to gain insights into the specific sensors used for collecting air quality data. By viewing sensor details, users can analyze time coverage and better understand the data’s reliability.

Key Fields

  • id: a unique identifier for each sensor.
  • name: The name of the sensor.
  • parameter: Information about the parameter measured, including the pollutant name , units , and display name. See the Parameters resource page for more information.
  • datetimeFirst: The datetime of the first measurement available in OpenAQ from the sensor, provided in UTC and local time See Dates, times and timezones for more information.
  • datetimeLast: The datetime of the last measurement available in OpenAQ from the sensor. See Dates, times and timezones for more information.
  • coverage: Includes details about data completeness, such as the expected number of measurements, actual counts, and the time period the data spans.
  • latest: The most recent recorded value and corresponding geographical coordinates (latitude and longitude). See the Latest resource page for more information.
  • summary: Statistical summary about the values across the lifetime of the sensor on OpenAQ, between datetimeFirst and datetimeLast, including minimum, maximum, average values.

Example response payload

https://api.openaq.org/v3/sensors/3917

{
  "meta": {
    "name": "openaq-api",
    "website": "/",
    "page": 1,
    "limit": 100,
    "found": 1
  },
  "results": [
    {
      "id": 3917,
      "name": "o3 ppm",
      "parameter": {
        "id": 10,
        "name": "o3",
        "units": "ppm",
        "displayName": "O₃"
      },
      "datetimeFirst": {
        "utc": "2016-03-06T20:00:00Z",
        "local": "2016-03-06T13:00:00-07:00"
      },
      "datetimeLast": {
        "utc": "2024-09-18T23:00:00Z",
        "local": "2024-09-18T17:00:00-06:00"
      },
      "coverage": {
        "expectedCount": 1,
        "expectedInterval": "01:00:00",
        "observedCount": 58447,
        "observedInterval": "58447:00:00",
        "percentComplete": 5844700.0,
        "percentCoverage": 5844700.0,
        "datetimeFrom": {
          "utc": "2016-03-06T20:00:00Z",
          "local": "2016-03-06T13:00:00-07:00"
        },
        "datetimeTo": {
          "utc": "2024-09-18T23:00:00Z",
          "local": "2024-09-18T17:00:00-06:00"
        }
      },
      "latest": {
        "datetime": {
          "utc": "2024-09-18T23:00:00Z",
          "local": "2024-09-18T17:00:00-06:00"
        },
        "value": 0.055,
        "coordinates": {
          "latitude": 35.1353,
          "longitude": -106.584702
        }
      },
      "summary": {
        "min": 0.0,
        "max": 0.109,
        "avg": 0.03580498661195457
      }
    }
  ]
}