Overview

Every item on Hacker News—whether it's a story, comment, poll, or job posting—has a unique identifier. When you need to retrieve specific content rather than browsing lists or feeds, querying by ID is the most direct and efficient approach. This method is particularly useful when you've identified an item of interest and want to access its complete details, or when you're following up on references from other queries.

Understanding Hacker News Item IDs

Hacker News assigns each piece of content a numeric identifier that never changes. You'll encounter these IDs in various contexts: they appear in URLs when browsing the site (for example, news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38471822), they're included in the data returned from other server queries, and they're often referenced in discussions. These IDs are sequential and permanent, making them reliable references for specific content.

How to Query by ID

To retrieve a specific item, simply request it through your AI assistant using natural language. You can ask for an item by its ID number, and the server will fetch the complete details. For example:

• "Get Hacker News item 38471822"
• "Show me details for item ID 40123456"
• "Retrieve the Hacker News post with ID 39876543"

The server understands these natural language requests and translates them into the appropriate API calls automatically.

What You'll Receive

When you query an item by ID, you'll receive structured information that varies depending on the item type:

For stories and submissions: You'll see the title, URL (if it's a link post), author, submission time, score, and the number of comments. You'll also get the list of comment IDs if you need to explore the discussion.

For comments: The response includes the comment text, author, timestamp, parent item ID, and any child comment IDs. This allows you to understand the comment's position within the conversation thread.

For other item types: Polls, poll options, and job postings each return their relevant metadata and content.

Common Use Cases

Querying by ID is essential when you're tracking specific discussions over time, following up on items referenced in other content, or building a deeper understanding of particular conversations. If someone mentions an important discussion or article, having the ID lets you jump directly to it without searching.

This approach is also valuable when you're working with comment threads. Starting from a story ID, you can retrieve child comment IDs and then query each comment individually to explore the full discussion tree at whatever depth you need.

Tips for Effective Querying

Keep item IDs organized when you're conducting research across multiple items. Since IDs are permanent, you can save them for future reference without worrying about broken links or changed content locations. When exploring comment threads, work systematically through the hierarchy to avoid missing important parts of the conversation.