Phonetic Encoder

Overview

Phonetic Encoder implements both algorithms directly. Each word is trimmed, uppercased and stripped of everything except A to Z before encoding, so digits, spaces, apostrophes and accented letters are dropped. A word with no letters left encodes to an empty string.

Soundex keeps the first letter and maps the remaining consonants to digits: B F P V to 1, C G J K Q S X Z to 2, D T to 3, L to 4, M N to 5 and R to 6. Adjacent letters with the same digit collapse into one. Vowels and Y separate repeats, so the second P in "Pepper" is still coded, while H and W do not, so "Ashcraft" encodes as A261. The code is padded with zeros or cut to exactly four characters.

Metaphone applies English spelling rules and has no fixed length. It drops the silent first letter of KN, GN, PN, AE and WR, turns WH into W and an initial X into S, keeps a vowel only when it is the first letter, and maps letter groups to sounds: PH to F, a C before I, E or Y to S, CH and SH to X, TH to 0 (theta), DGE to J. Repeated letters other than C are skipped. "Smith" and "Smythe" both encode as SM0.

`algorithm` is `soundex`, `metaphone` or `both` (the default) and controls which codes are returned. Passing `compare` switches to comparison mode: `word1` and `word2` echo the trimmed inputs, and `soundex` and `metaphone` become objects holding `word1Code`, `word2Code` and a boolean `match` that is true when the two codes are identical. The response is identical on every plan.

Live Test Phonetic Encoder API →

Endpoint

One host, one path per API. The block below shows this call in four languages; every one of them is the same HTTP request. Making requests covers the timeouts, retries and parameter rules that apply to all of them. The SDKs wrap the same call in a typed client.

1
2

curl "https://api.apiverve.com/v1/phonetic?word=smith&algorithm=both" \
  -H "x-api-key: your_api_key_here"

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

const res = await fetch('https://api.apiverve.com/v1/phonetic?word=smith&algorithm=both', {
  headers: { 'x-api-key': 'your_api_key_here' },
});

if (!res.ok) throw new Error(`${res.status} ${await res.text()}`);

const { data } = await res.json();
console.log(data);

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10

import requests

res = requests.get(
    "https://api.apiverve.com/v1/phonetic?word=smith&algorithm=both",
    headers={"x-api-key": "your_api_key_here"},
    timeout=15,
)
res.raise_for_status()

print(res.json()["data"])

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21

package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"io"
	"net/http"
)

func main() {
	req, _ := http.NewRequest("GET", "https://api.apiverve.com/v1/phonetic?word=smith&algorithm=both", nil)
	req.Header.Set("x-api-key", "your_api_key_here")

	res, err := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)
	if err != nil {
		panic(err)
	}
	defer res.Body.Close()

	out, _ := io.ReadAll(res.Body)
	fmt.Println(string(out))
}

Replace your_api_key_here with the key from your dashboard. When the inputs arrive as a list rather than one at a time, batch requests run up to 200 of them through this same API in a single call.

Authentication

Send your key in the x-api-key header. That is the only auth step — there is no token exchange and no per-endpoint scope to configure. Authentication covers creating, rotating and revoking keys.

Parameters

Sent in the query string. Premium parameters are accepted on every plan but only take effect on plans that include them.

Response

Every API returns the same three top-level keys, so one response handler covers your whole integration: status, error and data. Only data changes shape. Response format covers the envelope, the other output formats and how premium fields are withheld.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

{
  "status": "ok",
  "error": null,
  "data": {
    "word": "smith",
    "soundex": "S530",
    "metaphone": "SM0"
  }
}

Response fields

Paths are relative to data. Premium fields are absent rather than zeroed on plans that do not include them, so check for presence instead of comparing to 0.

Errors

Read the HTTP status first, then error for the specific reason. The body names the parameter that has to change. Error handling covers the full status list and which of them are worth retrying.

Use cases

Name Matching

Find similar names despite spelling variations

Search Enhancement

Improve search results with phonetic matching

Data Deduplication

Identify duplicate records with name variations

Genealogy Research

Match historical records with spelling variations

Other ways to use Phonetic Encoder

Set up Phonetic Encoder on APIVerve, or reach the same source a different way. Your APIVerve account and credits work on all of them — one key, one balance.

Related

More in Text Processing: