# ShipHawk

> ShipHawk is a shipping and warehouse automation platform for high-volume eCommerce,
> wholesale and manufacturing shippers. It combines a multi-carrier transportation
> management system (TMS), a warehouse management system (WMS), packing and rate
> optimization, and a shipping business-rules engine, and plugs into NetSuite, Acumatica,
> Infor, Microsoft Dynamics 365, Sage and SAP. Its public REST API (v4) covers rating,
> address validation, orders, proposed shipments, shipments, documents, SKUs, warehouses,
> tracking and webhooks.

Generated by API Evangelist (apievangelist.com) on 2026-08-27 from ShipHawk's own published
documentation. ShipHawk does not publish an llms.txt of its own — https://shiphawk.com/llms.txt
returned 404 and https://docs.shiphawk.com/llms.txt returns the full documentation HTML page
(a catch-all route, not a document), both probed 2026-08-27.

## What an agent needs to know first

- Base URL (production): https://shiphawk.com/api/v4
- Base URL (sandbox): https://sandbox.shiphawk.com/api/v4
- Auth: one API key per environment, sent as the `X-Api-Key` header (a query parameter
  `api_key` is also accepted and is used in ShipHawk's own examples — prefer the header).
- No OAuth, no scopes. A ShipHawk key carries full account authority.
- No idempotency mechanism. POST is used for both create and update; a retried booking is a
  duplicate shipment.
- No published rate limits and no rate-limit response headers. HTTP 429 is not in the
  documented status-code table.
- Errors are `{"error": "<message>"}` with an HTTP status code. Not RFC 9457.
- There is NO OpenAPI, GraphQL, AsyncAPI, gRPC or WSDL contract. The single Slate reference
  page at https://docs.shiphawk.com/ is the whole machine-facing surface.
- There is NO MCP server and NO A2A agent card.

## Documentation

- [API reference](https://docs.shiphawk.com/): the complete ShipHawk v4 REST reference, one page.
- [Authentication](https://docs.shiphawk.com/#authentication): API keys, header and query forms.
- [API principles](https://docs.shiphawk.com/#api-principles): REST style, JSON, no PUT/PATCH.
- [Sandbox and production environments](https://docs.shiphawk.com/#sandbox-and-production-environments): what the sandbox does and does not simulate.
- [Pagination params](https://docs.shiphawk.com/#pagination-params): page, per_page, sort, direction.
- [Status codes](https://docs.shiphawk.com/#status-codes): 400, 401, 402, 403, 404, 422, 423, 500.
- [Webhooks](https://docs.shiphawk.com/#webhooks): event catalog and subscription management.
- [Developer landing page](https://shiphawk.com/solutions/shipping-api/)
- [Help center](https://shiphawk.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/HELP)
- [Status page](https://shiphawk.statuspage.io/)

## Core operations

Rating
- POST /api/v4/rates — multi-carrier rate request. Results expire after 2 hours.

Addresses
- POST /api/v4/addresses/validate — validate an address
- POST /api/v4/addresses/check — check an address
- POST /api/v4/addresses, GET /api/v4/addresses/:id, GET /api/v4/addresses/search

Orders
- POST /api/v4/orders — create an order
- POST /api/v4/orders/:id — update an order
- GET /api/v4/orders, GET /api/v4/orders/:id
- POST /api/v4/orders/:order_number_or_id/cancel — cancel an order
- POST /api/v4/orders/hold, POST /api/v4/orders/restore — hold and release
- POST /api/v4/orders/:id/split_async, POST /api/v4/orders/combine — split and combine (async)
- GET /api/v4/orders/:id/order_line_items, /shipments, /proposed_shipments

Proposed shipments (plan before you book)
- POST /api/v4/orders/:id/proposed_shipments/generate — generate a plan
- POST /api/v4/orders/:id/proposed_shipments/book — book it (spends money, tenders to a carrier)
- POST /api/v4/orders/:id/proposed_shipments/book_async — async booking, poll a job tracker
- DELETE /api/v4/orders/:id/proposed_shipments/:proposed_shipment_id

Shipments
- POST /api/v4/shipments — create and book a shipment
- GET /api/v4/shipments, GET /api/v4/shipments/:id
- DELETE /api/v4/shipments/:id — cancel a shipment
- GET /api/v4/shipments/:id/tracking — tracking events
- GET /api/v4/shipments/:id/labels, /bol, /commercial_invoice, /address_labels, /packing_slip
- GET/POST/DELETE /api/v4/shipments/:id/documents, /notes

Catalog and facilities
- POST /api/v4/skus, GET /api/v4/skus/search, GET /api/v4/skus/counts, DELETE /api/v4/skus
- POST /api/v4/bulk_sku_imports, GET /api/v4/bulk_sku_imports/:id
- GET /api/v4/warehouses, GET /api/v4/workstations
- GET/POST/DELETE /api/v4/materials/containers — packaging material
- GET /api/v4/unpacked_item_types/search

Async and events
- GET /api/v4/job_trackers/:id — poll any asynchronous operation
- GET /api/v4/webhooks/events — list available event types
- POST/GET/DELETE /api/v4/webhooks — manage subscriptions

## Webhook events

shipment.status_update, shipment.address_update, shipment.notes_update,
shipment.timing_update, shipment.tracking_update, shipment.documents_update,
shipment.create_from_order, shipment.create, proposed_shipment.create,
order.document_create

Callbacks are optionally protected with HTTP Basic auth. There is no HMAC signature, so a
receiver cannot cryptographically verify a payload came from ShipHawk. No retry, ordering or
delivery guarantees are published — reconcile against GET /api/v4/shipments/:id.

## Safety notes for autonomous use

- Booking a shipment or a proposed shipment creates a real carrier obligation and a real cost.
- Reversal paths exist (DELETE /api/v4/shipments/:id, POST .../cancel, POST /api/v4/orders/restore)
  but ShipHawk publishes NO time window or state boundary for any of them. Do not assume a
  cancellation is still possible.
- DELETE /api/v4/skus/all deletes the entire product catalogue with no published restore path.
- POST /api/v4/shipments/:id/documents/email sends mail to real recipients and cannot be recalled.
- The shared sandbox does not dispatch to carriers only while no production carrier credentials
  are attached to the account. Confirm that before treating sandbox actions as inert.

## First-party client libraries

- Ruby: https://rubygems.org/gems/shiphawk (0.8.1, released 2015-11-03) —
  https://github.com/ShipHawk/shiphawk-ruby
- Python: https://github.com/ShipHawk/shiphawk-python (source only, never on PyPI, 2015)
- Node: https://github.com/ShipHawk/shiphawk-node (source only, never on npm, 2015)
- Elixir: https://github.com/ShipHawk/shiphawk-elixir (source only, 2015)
- Magento 2: https://github.com/ShipHawk/shiphawk-magento-2 (actively maintained)
- WooCommerce: https://github.com/ShipHawk/shiphawk-woocommerce-plugin

Every API client library predates the v4 documentation by roughly a decade. Call the REST API
directly rather than depending on them.

## Commercial

- No public pricing. https://shiphawk.com/pricing redirects to the home page.
- No self-service signup. Access is arranged through sales.
- Sign in: https://login.myshiphawk.com/
- Terms: https://shiphawk.com/terms-and-conditions/
- Privacy: https://shiphawk.com/privacy/
- Support: support@shiphawk.com · Sales: contact@shiphawk.com · +1 805-335-2432

## API Evangelist artifacts in this repository

- apis.yml — the APIs.json index for ShipHawk
- authentication/shiphawk-authentication.yml
- conventions/shiphawk-conventions.yml — including reversibility
- errors/shiphawk-problem-types.yml
- lifecycle/shiphawk-lifecycle.yml
- data-model/shiphawk-data-model.yml
- asyncapi/shiphawk-webhooks.yml
- sandbox/shiphawk-sandbox.yml
- conformance/shiphawk-conformance.yml
- packages/shiphawk-packages.yml
- plans/shiphawk-plans-pricing.yml
- rate-limits/shiphawk-rate-limits.yml
- well-known/shiphawk-well-known.yml
- mcp/shiphawk-mcp.yml — records that no MCP server exists
- security/shiphawk-domain-security.yml