Export Formats

BibTeX

zot.add_parameters(format='bibtex')
bibtex_db = zot.top(limit=50)
# Returns a bibtexparser BibDatabase object

# Access entries as list of dicts
entries = bibtex_db.entries
for entry in entries:
    print(entry.get('title'), entry.get('author'))

# Write to .bib file
import bibtexparser
with open('library.bib', 'w') as f:
    bibtexparser.dump(bibtex_db, f)

CSL-JSON

zot.add_parameters(content='csljson', limit=50)
csl_items = zot.items()
# Returns a list of dicts in CSL-JSON format

Bibliography HTML (formatted citations)

# APA style bibliography
zot.add_parameters(content='bib', style='apa')
bib_entries = zot.items(limit=50)
# Returns list of HTML <div> strings

for entry in bib_entries:
    print(entry)  # e.g. '<div>Smith, J. (2024). Title. <i>Journal</i>...</div>'

Note: format='bib' removes the limit parameter. The API enforces a max of 150 items.

Available Citation Styles

Pass any valid CSL style name from the Zotero style repository:

'apa'
'chicago-author-date'
'chicago-note-bibliography'
'mla'
'vancouver'
'ieee'
'harvard-cite-them-right'
'nature'

In-Text Citations

zot.add_parameters(content='citation', style='apa')
citations = zot.items(limit=50)
# Returns list of HTML <span> elements: ['<span>(Smith, 2024)</span>', ...]

Other Formats

Set content to any Zotero export format:

Format	`content` value	Returns
BibTeX	`'bibtex'`	via `format='bibtex'`
CSL-JSON	`'csljson'`	list of dicts
RIS	`'ris'`	list of unicode strings
RDF (Dublin Core)	`'rdf_dc'`	list of unicode strings
Zotero RDF	`'rdf_zotero'`	list of unicode strings
BibLaTeX	`'biblatex'`	list of unicode strings
Wikipedia Citation Templates	`'wikipedia'`	list of unicode strings

Note: When using an export format as content, you must provide a limit parameter. Multiple simultaneous format retrieval is not supported.

# Export as RIS
zot.add_parameters(content='ris', limit=50)
ris_data = zot.items()
with open('library.ris', 'w', encoding='utf-8') as f:
    f.write('\n'.join(ris_data))

Keys Only

# Get item keys as a newline-delimited string
zot.add_parameters(format='keys')
keys_str = zot.items()
keys = keys_str.strip().split('\n')

Version Information (for syncing)

# Dict of {key: version} for all items
zot.add_parameters(format='versions')
versions = zot.items()

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