API errors are divided between two classes: system errors and request errors.

A unique code that identifies the particular error condition that occurred. Your application can use error codes as identifiers in your customized error-handling algorithms.

Some warning and error messages return one or more variables that contain contextual information about the error. This is often the field or value that triggered the error. You can usually predict where these will occur by looking at the "replaceable_value" indicators in our Errors by Number page.

A more detailed description of the condition that raised the error.

Indicates whether the error caused the request to fail.

If the request fails and the source of the problem is within the application (such as a missing required element), please change the application before you retry the request. If the problem is due to end-user input data, please alert the end-user to the problem and provide the means for them to correct the data. Once the problem in the application or data is resolved, you can attempt to re-send the request to eBay.

If the source of the problem is on eBay's side, you can retry the request as-is a reasonable number of times (eBay recommends twice). If the error persists, contact Developer Technical Support. Once the problem has been resolved, the request may be resent in its original form.

When a warning occurs, the error is returned in addition to the business data. In this case, you do not need to retry the request (as the original request was successful). However, depending on the cause or nature of the warning, you might need to contact either the end user or eBay to effect a long term solution to the problem to prevent it from reoccurring in the future.

A brief description of the condition that raised the error.