ancestors: Get term ancestors

API: ac.uk:embl-ebi-ontology-lookup-service-ols-api
Endpoint: /ontologies/{ontologyId}/terms/{termId}/ancestors
Response format: application/json
Auth: none
Method: GET
Last Status: 200
Latency: 214ms

Description

Returns all ancestor terms (transitive superclasses) of the specified term

Parameters (5)

lang (string, query, optional, default: en)

Language code

ontologyId (string, path, required)

Ontology ID (e.g., 'go', 'efo', 'mondo')

page (integer, query, optional, default: 0)

Page number (0-indexed)

size (integer, query, optional, default: 20)

Page size

termId (string, path, required)

Term IRI (URL-encoded, typically double-encoded)

Examples (1)

Get ancestors of independent continuant probe-gate
curl 'https://www.ebi.ac.uk/ols4/api/ontologies/go/terms/http%253A%252F%252Fpurl.obolibrary.org%252Fobo%252FBFO_0000004/ancestors'
import requests

resp = requests.get("https://www.ebi.ac.uk/ols4/api/ontologies/go/terms/http%253A%252F%252Fpurl.obolibrary.org%252Fobo%252FBFO_0000004/ancestors")
data = resp.json()
import zingu_apis

api = zingu_apis.api("embl-ebi-ontology-lookup-service-ols")
result = api.fetch("ontologies/{ontologyId}/terms/{termId}/ancestors")

for item in result:
    print(item)
const resp = await fetch("https://www.ebi.ac.uk/ols4/api/ontologies/go/terms/http%253A%252F%252Fpurl.obolibrary.org%252Fobo%252FBFO_0000004/ancestors");
const data = await resp.json();

Probe History

Latency

Status Codes

TimeStatusLatencySize
2026-04-16 17:49:09.544158 200 214ms
2026-04-16 03:21:12.973272 200 496ms
2026-04-15 00:54:57.264199 200 268ms
2026-04-14 02:45:25.379025 200 346ms
2026-04-12 16:43:35.317103 200 210ms
2026-04-10 00:40:05.991116 200 195ms
2026-04-09 03:30:23.313566 200 226ms
2026-04-08 07:58:27.127828 200 321ms
2026-04-07 01:39:27.266105 200 226ms
2026-04-05 19:33:49.949780 200 246ms