Backpack Exchange Python API guide

Get your API keys if you are going to use account endpoints: https://backpack.exchange/portfolio/settings/api-keys

Install the required Python libraries:

• cryptography – for X-Signature (account endpoints only)

• requests – for making HTTP requests (or aiohttp if you prefer async)

pip3 install cryptography requests 

Install dotenv-python to securely manage your keys using environment variables if you are going to use account endpoints

pip3 install python-dotenv

Create a .env file and store your keys like this:

PUBLIC_KEY=zDIJj9qneWIY0IYZ5aXoHcNMCm+XDhVcTssiT0HyY0A=
SECRET_KEY=4odxgSUxFrC/zsKWZF4OQwYAgnNu9hnWH3NxWfLAPz4=

Create a .gitignore file and add .env to exclude it from version control.

.env

For all examples, we will use the synchronous requests library. Let's import it:

import requests

Public endpoints

For public endpoints, simply send a GET request.

No API keys are required.

Example

# https://docs.backpack.exchange/#tag/Markets/operation/get_open_interest
BASE_URL: str = "https://api.backpack.exchange/"  # base api url for all endpoints
symbol: str = "SOL_USDC_PERP" # let's specify the symbol
result_url: str = f"{BASE_URL}api/v1/openInterest?symbol={symbol}"  # add your argument as a query string. For GET requests you need only query string

from json import JSONDecodeError

response = requests.get(url=result_url) # make a get request
print(f"response status code: {response}")
if response.status_code == 200:
    # make your code safe in case you receive unexpected data
    try:
        print(f"response json: {response.json()}") 
        
        open_interest: str = response.json()[0]["openInterest"]
        print(f"open interest: {open_interest}")
    except JSONDecodeError:
        print(f"response text if response isn't json: {response.text}")
else:
    ...

response status code: <Response [200]>
response json: [{'openInterest': '81420.17', 'symbol': 'SOL_USDC_PERP', 'timestamp': 1743731167028}]
open interest: 81420.17

If you have more than one argument, join them using the & symbol.

Private endpoints

For private endpoints we need to create spesific headers and a request body (for POST requests)

import base64 # import base64 as "The signature should then be base64 encoded"
from time import time # import time for timestamp 
import os  # import os – to access environment variables

from cryptography.hazmat.primitives.asymmetric import ed25519 # import ed25519 to create a private key that will sign the message
# from dotenv import load_dotenv, find_dotenv # to create env variables from your .env file

# use this in your code
# load_dotenv(find_dotenv())
# public_key: str = os.getenv("PUBLIC_KEY")
# secret_key: str = os.getenv("SECRET_KEY")

public_key: str = "zDIJj9qneWIY0IYZ5aXoHcNMCm+XDhVcTssiT0HyY0A="  # unsafe!
secret_key: str = "4odxgSUxFrC/zsKWZF4OQwYAgnNu9hnWH3NxWfLAPz4="  # unsafe!

private_key = ed25519.Ed25519PrivateKey.from_private_bytes(
            base64.b64decode(secret_key)
        )

Let’s retrieve the deposit address.

https://docs.backpack.exchange/#tag/Capital/operation/get_deposit_address

timestamp = int(time() * 1e3)  # Unix time in milliseconds
window: str = "5000" # Time window in milliseconds that the request is valid for. Increase if you have bad connection.

Now that X-Timestamp (timestamp), X-Window (window) and X-API-Key (public_key) are ready. Let's create X-Signature

instruction: str = "depositAddressQuery"
sign_str = f"instruction={instruction}"

# This endpoint requires the "blockchain" parameter
params: dict = {
    "blockchain": "Solana",
}
# Generic code to generate a valid query string from any parameters
sorted_params_list = []
for key, value in sorted(params.items()):
    if isinstance(value, bool):  # boolean variables should be lowercase in query strings
        value = str(value).lower()
    sorted_params_list.append(f"{key}={value}")
sorted_params = "&".join(sorted_params_list)


if sorted_params:
    sign_str += "&" + sorted_params
sign_str += f"&timestamp={timestamp}&window={window}" 

print(sign_str)

instruction=depositAddressQuery&blockchain=Solana&timestamp=1743731167786&window=5000

Now let's sign it!

signature_bytes = private_key.sign(sign_str.encode())
encoded_signature = base64.b64encode(signature_bytes).decode()
print(f"signed query string: {encoded_signature}")

signed query string: lLc/zjqju853/hmCdb9dXtMhUijoetARooBn56hqbxPNXZTV9Gy18YcBjZ8+HuPDJHz6LmeB/366bJ5uTCZSAA==

Create headers:

headers = {
            "X-API-Key": public_key,
            "X-Signature": encoded_signature,
            "X-Timestamp": str(timestamp),
            "X-Window": window,
            "Content-Type": "application/json; charset=utf-8",
        }

Send request:

url = "https://api.backpack.exchange/wapi/v1/capital/deposit/address"
response = requests.get(url=url, headers=headers, params=params)
print(response.json())

{'address': '8PzpK8s8ezuSnXPjdPxR2FdZfzm5urkcUePrDL419PRC'}

Note:

For POST requests, include the JSON body and use the post() method.

url_example = "https://api.backpack.exchange/wapi/v1/example"
response = requests.post(url=url, headers=headers, json=params)

SDK

SDK makes the development process much easier!

Example:

https://github.com/sndmndss/bpx-py