category

Retrieve FRED category information

Since R2026a

Syntax

d = category(c,s)

d = category(c,s,t)

d = category(c,s,t,fredParams)

[d,response] = category(___)

Description

d = category(c,s) returns a table that contains Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED^®) category information, where c is a fredrs connection object and s is the category ID.

d = category(c,s,t) specifies the type of category information, t, to retrieve. For example, data = category(c,s,"children") retrieves the subcategories associated with a given category ID.

d = category(c,s,t,fredParams) additionally specifies a comma-separated list of FRED REST API parameters. For example, category(c,"125","series","limit","8","order_by","frequency") returns a table with a limit of eight time series sorted by frequency for category 125. For more details about specifying FRED parameters, see the FRED API documentation.

[d,response] = category(___) also returns a response message for any of the previous syntaxes.

Examples

Retrieve FRED Category Information

This example assumes that you have obtained your API user token from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis website and you stored it in the MATLAB^® vault by using the setSecret function.

Use the getSecret function to retrieve your API user token from the MATLAB vault. Then, create a connection to the FRED server by using the fredrs function.

APIkey = getSecret("MyAPIkeyFREDRS");
c = fredrs(APIkey);

Retrieve information for category 13.

s = "13";
[d,response] = category(c,s)

d =

  1×3 table

    id                     name                      parent_id
    __    _______________________________________    _________

    13    U.S. Trade & International Transactions      32992  


response = 

  ResponseMessage with properties:

    StatusLine: 'HTTP/1.1 200 OK'
    StatusCode: OK
        Header: [1×13 matlab.net.http.HeaderField]
          Body: [1×1 matlab.net.http.MessageBody]
     Completed: 0

Retrieve the subcategories for category 13.

t = "children";
d = category(c,s,t)

d =

  6×3 table

     id                      name                     parent_id
    _____    _____________________________________    _________

       16    {'Exports'                          }       13    
       17    {'Imports'                          }       13    
     3000    {'Income Payments & Receipts'       }       13    
    33705    {'International Investment Position'}       13    
      125    {'Trade Balance'                    }       13    
      127    {'U.S. International Finance'       }       13

Input Arguments

c — FRED REST connection

fredrs object

FRED REST connection, specified as a fredrs object.

s — Category ID

string scalar | character vector

Category ID, specified as a string scalar or character vector.

Example: s = "13"

Data Types: string | char

t — Type of category information

string scalar | character vector

Type of category information to retrieve, specified as a string scalar or character vector. For a given category, you can specify any of the following types:

• "children" – Get the subcategories for a specified parent category.

• "related" – Get the related categories for a category.

• "series" – Get the time series in a category.

• "tags" – Get the tags for a category.

• "related_tags" – Get the related tags for a category.

Data Types: string | char

fredParams — FRED REST API arguments

FRED REST API argument list

FRED REST API arguments, specified as a comma-separated list. For example, category(c,"125","series","order_by","popularity") retrieves the series in category 125 based on how frequently the series is accessed. For more information about specifying FRED parameters, see the FRED REST API documentation.

Output Arguments

d — FRED category information

table

FRED category information, returned as a table.

response — HTTP request response

ResponseMessage object

HTTP request response, returned as a ResponseMessage object. For details, see matlab.net.http.ResponseMessage.

Version History

Introduced in R2026a