Events and scoreboard API

The league's current scoreboard window: recent finals, live games and upcoming games, with teams, scores, status, venue, season/week and broadcast info. Data is aggregated from public sources and is typically 20-30 seconds behind live play (about 1 second after our source). There is no SLA.

Paths and parameters

GET/api/v1/sports/{sport}/leagues/{league}/events

List events for a league. Current and upcoming events (the provider's current scoreboard window). For a specific date range or week use the season schedule endpoint.

  • sport (path, required): Sport slug: football, basketball, baseball, hockey, soccer.
  • league (path, required): League slug, e.g. nfl, college-football, nba, mens-college-basketball, mlb, nhl, eng.1, usa.1.
  • limit (query): Maximum events to return (default 50).
  • includeOdds (query): Attach current betting odds (when available) to each event. Adds latency.

Live example

Request

curl -H "Authorization: Bearer $RSA_API_KEY" \
  "https://www.realtimesportsapi.com/api/v1/sports/football/leagues/nfl/events?limit=1"

Response captured from live data at 2026-10-05 02:10 UTC (refreshed every few minutes). Long arrays are trimmed; meta.rateLimit values are illustrative for a Free key.

Response

{
  "success": true,
  "data": [
    {
      "id": "401872978",
      "uid": "s:20~l:28~e:401872978",
      "name": "Detroit Lions at Carolina Panthers",
      "shortName": "DET @ CAR",
      "date": "2026-10-05T00:20Z",
      "status": {
        "state": "in",
        "completed": false,
        "period": 3,
        "clock": "12:20",
        "detail": "12:20 - 3rd Quarter",
        "halftime": false,
        "firstHalfEnded": true
      },
      "homeTeam": {
        "id": "29",
        "name": "Carolina Panthers",
        "abbreviation": "CAR",
        "logo": "https://realtimesportsapi.com/api/images/proxy?id=GgcVSgNPTUMITUgaFFQVVVQXBVwOHV5LRQBZD1lbBllDXR0HVl9AUlxGAEwbSkoYVg",
        "color": "0085ca",
        "alternateColor": "000000",
        "winner": false,
        "score": 16
      },
      "awayTeam": {
        "id": "8",
        "name": "Detroit Lions",
        "abbreviation": "DET",
        "logo": "https://realtimesportsapi.com/api/images/proxy?id=GgcVSgNPTUMITUgaFFQVVVQXBVwOHV5LRQBZD1lbBllDXR0HVl9AUlxGB0gdSkoYVg",
        "color": "0076b6",
        "alternateColor": "bbbbbb",
        "winner": false,
        "score": 16
      },
      "competition": {
        "attendance": 0,
        "neutralSite": false,
        "conferenceCompetition": false,
        "divisionCompetition": false,
        "playByPlayAvailable": true,
        "highlightsAvailable": true
      },
      "venue": {
        "id": "3628",
        "name": "Bank of America Stadium",
        "city": "Charlotte",
        "state": "NC",
        "indoor": false,
        "grass": false
      },
      "notes": [],
      "season": {
        "year": 2026,
        "displayName": "2026",
        "type": {
          "id": "2",
          "name": "Regular Season",
          "abbreviation": "reg"
        },
        "week": {
          "number": 4,
          "startDate": "2026-09-30T07:00Z",
          "endDate": "2026-10-07T06:59Z",
          "text": "Week 4"
        }
      },
      "broadcasts": [
        {
          "network": {
            "id": "1",
            "type": "National"
          },
          "type": "TV"
        }
      ],
      "officials": [
        {
          "id": "17690",
          "fullName": "Greg Wilson",
          "displayName": "Greg Wilson",
          "order": 1,
          "position": "Back Judge"
        },
        {
          "id": "3055005",
          "fullName": "Clay Martin",
          "displayName": "Clay Martin",
          "order": 2,
          "position": "Referee"
        },
        {
          "id": "3055221",
          "fullName": "Eugene Hall",
          "displayName": "Eugene Hall",
          "order": 3,
          "position": "Side Judge"
        },
        "... 4 more"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "meta": {
    "rateLimit": {
      "limit": 125,
      "remaining": 124,
      "reset": 1793491200000
    }
  }
}

Fields

FieldTypeNotes
idstringEvent id; use it with the detail, plays, box score and odds endpoints.
uidstring
namestringFull matchup name.
shortNamestringAbbreviated matchup, e.g. "AWAY @ HOME".
datestringStart time, ISO-8601 UTC.
statusEventStatusstate (pre, in, post), completed, period, clock and display detail.
homeTeamEventTeamid, name, abbreviation, colors, logo (proxied), record, score, winner.
awayTeamEventTeamSame shape as homeTeam.
competitionobjectattendance, neutralSite, conference/division flags, playByPlayAvailable.
venueobjectVenue id, name, city, state, indoor, grass (null when unknown).
notesstring[]Headline notes, e.g. round or rivalry names.
seasonobjectyear, type (preseason/regular/postseason) and week where the league uses weeks.
broadcastsobject[]TV/stream networks for the game.
officialsobject[]Game officials when published.
oddsOddsOnly with includeOdds=true and when the game has odds.

League support

Checked against live data on 2026-10-04: 29 available, 0 limited, 0 seasonal or not verified, 0 not available.

Code samples

curl

curl -H "Authorization: Bearer $RSA_API_KEY" \
  "https://www.realtimesportsapi.com/api/v1/sports/football/leagues/nfl/events?limit=1"

JavaScript (fetch)

const res = await fetch("https://www.realtimesportsapi.com/api/v1/sports/football/leagues/nfl/events?limit=1", {
  headers: { Authorization: `Bearer ${process.env.RSA_API_KEY}` }
});
const { success, data, meta } = await res.json();
console.log(data, meta.rateLimit);

Python (requests)

import os, requests

res = requests.get(
    "https://www.realtimesportsapi.com/api/v1/sports/football/leagues/nfl/events?limit=1",
    headers={"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['RSA_API_KEY']}"},
    timeout=10,
)
body = res.json()
print(body["data"])

MCP prompt (Claude, Cursor, ChatGPT)

Using the Realtime Sports MCP server (https://www.realtimesportsapi.com/api/mcp), call get_events with sport "football" and league "nfl" and list the games it returns with start times, status and scores for NFL.

Connect the hosted MCP server first: setup guide. Each tool call counts as one API call.

Rate limits and pricing

PlanPriceCallsRateWebSocketWebhooks
Free$0125/mo (1,000 first 30 days)1/s500 msgs/moNo
Starter$29/mo ($290/yr)10,000/mo5/sShares monthly poolShares monthly pool
Growth$49/mo ($490/yr)25,000/mo10/sShares monthly poolShares monthly pool
Pro$99/mo ($990/yr)50,000/mo20/s100,000 msgs/mo25,000/mo
Scale$299/mo ($2,990/yr)500,000/mo100/s500,000 msgs/mo100,000/mo

Every successful REST call counts as one call. Over the limit you get HTTP 429 with a Retry-After header. No SLA. Full pricing.

FAQ

What does the events (scoreboard) endpoint return?
The league's current scoreboard window: recent finals, live games and upcoming games, with teams, scores, status, venue, season/week and broadcast info.
Which leagues support events (scoreboard)?
All 29 monitored leagues returned data when we checked on 2026-10-04.
Is it free to try?
Yes. The Free plan is $0 with 125 calls per month (1,000 in the first 30 days) at 1 request per second, no card required. Every successful call counts as one call.
How fresh is the data?
Data is aggregated from public sources and is typically 20-30 seconds behind live play (about 1 second after our source). There is no SLA.
Can I get updates pushed instead of polling?
Webhooks are included on every paid plan (Starter, Growth, Pro, Scale). WebSocket is included on paid plans, and the Free plan gets a 500-message monthly preview.