KickoffAPI Review 2026

KickoffAPI is a football (soccer) data API. It serves fixtures, live scores, standings, lineups, player and team statistics, head-to-head records, odds and expected goals (xG) as JSON. The site claims 1,245 leagues in 171 countries, from top flights to lower divisions. You authenticate with an x-api-key header and call REST endpoints under api.kickoffapi.com/api/v2.

It covers football only. Teams that need other sports can run it next to a provider from the sports data API list.

One flat plan reaches every league, with no per-league setup (checked November 2026). Coverage varies by competition, so a listed league does not always have every optional dataset, such as lineups or xG. The site tells you to ask before you build on a specific competition.

Main resources:

• Fixtures and live scores: filter by league, season, team or date, or pass live=all for matches in play.
• One match in full: events, lineups, statistics and head-to-head.
• Tables and leaders: standings, top scorers and top assists.
• Reference data: leagues, teams, players, transfers, coaches, injuries and venues.
• Odds: pre-match and in-play prices on paid plans.

The match archive goes back to 1872 for selected competitions. Depth varies, and smaller leagues are shallower.

Ultra and Enterprise plans get a server-sent events stream at /api/v2/stream. It pushes kickoff, goal, card, substitution, full-time and odds-change events. The same events can arrive as signed webhooks. Lower plans poll the REST API with live=all. Our live odds API guide covers the push versus poll tradeoff.

KickoffAPI also runs an official MCP server for AI apps, and it computes its own match projections and an xG model on paid plans. The provider is candid about limits. Its docs say the free plan is for prototyping, that it ships no video, and that another product gives more requests at one price point.

The free Hobby plan gives 100 requests a day at 30 a minute, with no card (checked November 2026). It covers fixtures, live scores, standings and other core endpoints, but not predictions or xG, and it asks for a visible "Powered by KickoffAPI" credit. Starter costs $9 a month for 7,500 requests a day. Pro costs $29 for 75,000, and Ultra costs $49 for 250,000.

Enterprise pricing is on request and comes with a 99.9% uptime SLA. Yearly billing gives two months free, and each paid plan starts with a 7-day trial. For other free options, see the free sports APIs we track.

You create an account on the KickoffAPI sign-up page with an email and a password. The free Hobby plan needs no card and does not expire (checked November 2026). Paid plans start with a one-time 7-day trial that begins when you add a card.

Send the key in an x-api-key header on every call. The live stream route also accepts ?key=, because a browser EventSource cannot set headers. The Hobby plan gives you 100 requests a day and 30 a minute. It asks for a visible "Powered by KickoffAPI" credit, linked to the site, wherever you show the data.

This sample calls GET /api/v2/fixtures on https://api.kickoffapi.com with the key in x-api-key (from the docs, checked November 2026). With no filter, the window starts at 00:00 UTC today and runs forward, so you get what is next.

import os

import requests

resp = requests.get(
    "https://api.kickoffapi.com/api/v2/fixtures",
    headers={"x-api-key": os.environ["KICKOFFAPI_API_KEY"]},
    params={"limit": 5},
    timeout=10,
)
resp.raise_for_status()

for fx in resp.json()["data"]:
    print(fx["date"], fx["home"]["name"], "v", fx["away"]["name"], fx["status"]["short"])

The response wraps a data list and a meta object that holds a nextCursor for paging. Each fixture has home and away team objects, a score and a status.short code such as NS, FT or 2H.

Limits depend on the plan (checked November 2026). Hobby gets 100 requests a day and 30 a minute. Starter gets 7,500 and 120, Pro gets 75,000 and 300, and Ultra gets 250,000 and 600. Every response carries X-RateLimit-* headers for the minute window and X-RateLimit-Daily-* headers for the day, and every 429 carries Retry-After. The daily count resets at 00:00 UTC. Lists page with limit (maximum 2000) and cursor.

The docs link OpenAPI specs for v2 and v1, a Postman collection and clients for JavaScript, Python, PHP, Dart, C#, Kotlin and Swift. An official MCP server runs with npx -y @kickoffapi/mcp. Support is support@kickoffapi.com, with a best-effort reply in about 3 business days on the free plan. The docs mark v1 as legacy until 1 January 2027, so start on v2.

KickoffAPI suits three kinds of project:

• Live-score and fantasy apps that need fixtures, tables and events across many leagues.
• Prediction and analytics builders who want xG and match projections from the same key.
• Bot and agent builders who want football data through MCP or webhooks.

A team that needs sharp odds from many sportsbooks can pair it with a feed from the sports odds API guide.

KickoffAPI is a focused football API with a usable free plan and a low first paid step at $9. Push delivery and the xG model sit on paid tiers, which is a fair split for a free key.

Start with the free key at kickoffapi.com and test the leagues you care about before you commit.

Last updated: 5 November 2026 · How providers get listed