National Bank of Ethiopia Exchange Rate API: Official ETB Rates as JSON

The National Bank of Ethiopia publishes the official exchange rates that accounting, tax, and customs practice in Ethiopia reference — published official rates, not moving market prices. This guide shows how to pull them as JSON: via a REST endpoint or the zero-dependency national-bank-of-ethiopia-exchange-rate npm package.

The rate of a brand-new float

Ethiopia floated the birr in July 2024 — one of the most consequential African currency reforms in decades — and the NBE now publishes daily indicative rates: a weighted average of banks’ actual foreign-exchange transactions from the previous day, with buying and selling sides. That transaction-weighted construction makes it a genuine market measure with official standing, the reference for a rapidly repricing economy.

Why official rates, not market rates

A live mid-market feed answers "what is USD/ETB trading at right now?" — the right tool for checkouts and dashboards. But accountants, auditors, and tax authorities ask a different question: "which rate were you required to use for this date?" That answer comes from the National Bank of Ethiopia’s published rates, and it never changes after publication.

Get the latest rates (REST)

curl "https://allratestoday.com/api/v1/central-bank/nbe/latest" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"

The response is the bank's most recent published table — every rate and the publication date. The latest rates are available on every plan, including the free tier (300 requests/month, no credit card).

The npm SDK

npm install national-bank-of-ethiopia-exchange-rate

import { getRate, getLatestRates } from 'national-bank-of-ethiopia-exchange-rate';

// One pair at the official rate
const pair = await getRate('USD', 'ETB', { apiKey: 'art_live_...' });
console.log(pair.rate, pair.rate_date);

// The bank's full published table
const table = await getLatestRates({ apiKey: 'art_live_...' });
console.log(table.rate_date, table.rates.length);

Zero dependencies, TypeScript types included, and it runs anywhere fetch exists — Node 18+, Bun, Deno, and edge runtimes.

Historical rates for an invoice date

import { getRatesForDate, getHistory } from 'national-bank-of-ethiopia-exchange-rate';

const day = await getRatesForDate('2026-08-18', { apiKey: 'art_live_...' });

const series = await getHistory(
  { source: 'USD', target: 'ETB', from: '2026-01-01' },
  { apiKey: 'art_live_...' }
);

Historical dates and time series need a paid plan; the latest rates stay free.

Published vs derived pairs

If the National Bank of Ethiopia does not print a pair directly, the API resolves it from the bank's published rates — an inverse, or a cross via ETB — and flags it derived: true with the method used. Official and computed values are never silently mixed, which is exactly the distinction an auditor will ask about.

The archive

The series starts in late September 2024, shortly after the float, and records the birr’s move from the old 57-per-dollar crawl into the 100s and beyond.

FAQ

Does the National Bank of Ethiopia have an official exchange rate API?

The bank publishes its official rates on its own site, and AllRatesToday serves the same published rates as clean JSON via REST or the national-bank-of-ethiopia-exchange-rate npm package. The latest table is free.

How do I get the official Ethiopia exchange rate for a past date?

The rates-for-date endpoint returns the official table for any archived date; non-publication days resolve to the most recent published date and are flagged, so audit trails stay honest. Historical dates require a paid plan; latest rates are free.

Is this the pre-float official rate too?

No — the published API series begins with the post-float regime (late September 2024). The pre-float crawling-peg values belong to a different arrangement and are not part of this feed.