OpenActive Dataset and Open Booking API for Sport, Fitness, and Leisure Sites
Publishes your classes and sessions in the open standard agents and aggregators already use to book activities.
What this signal tests
We check whether your site exposes an OpenActive dataset - an open data standard purpose-built for sport, fitness, and leisure operators - and whether that dataset references an Open Booking API endpoint where an agent or aggregator can actually reserve a class, court, or session. Both the dataset description and the booking endpoint must be declared.
Why it matters for your visibility in AI
OpenActive is one of the few established open standards that already gives AI agents a real, working machine-bookable surface for physical activities. Hundreds of UK leisure operators, councils, and gym chains publish OpenActive feeds today, and they are already being consumed by aggregators, activity finders, and increasingly by AI assistants helping users find a yoga class tonight or a tennis court this weekend. For a leisure or fitness operator, this is a near-direct sales channel that is invisible without the markup. An assistant told to find a beginner pilates class at six p.m. will list operators that publish OpenActive and skip those that do not - even when the missing operator is closer or cheaper. The cost of adoption is low; the cost of being unbookable is the entire opportunity.
Pass criteria at a glance
| Criterion | Passes when |
|---|---|
| Valid dataset with Open Booking API endpoint declared. |
How we test it
Our scanner probes the conventional paths /openactive, /dataset, and /data for a JSON-LD document whose @context is openactive.io and whose @type is Dataset. It then inspects the dataset's distribution field for a reference to your Open Booking API base URL. Both pieces must be present: the dataset describing your sessions, and the API endpoint where bookings can be placed.
Show technical detection method
/openactive, /dataset, /data has JSON-LD with @context openactive.io and @type Dataset declaring distribution referencing Open Booking API base URL.
If your site fails: how to fix it
- Confirm OpenActive is appropriate for your business - it is designed for physical activities like classes, court bookings, and leisure sessions; the work to do this is best done by a developer who can read the OpenActive specification.
- Adopt a booking system that already supports OpenActive output (Legend, BookWhen, Playwaze, and similar platforms publish OpenActive feeds natively) or build the RPDE feeds yourself.
- Publish an OpenActive Dataset Site at /openactive following the published template, declaring your distribution feeds and the base URL of your Open Booking API.
- Register the dataset with the OpenActive data catalog so aggregators and AI assistants can discover it without having to crawl your site directly.
- Monitor the OpenActive validator and status page periodically to confirm your feeds remain valid; broken feeds quietly drop you out of aggregator results.
Quick facts
| Maturity | ESTABLISHED |
|---|---|
| Weight | low |
| Category | Agent Actions |
Primary sources
Related signals
Frequently asked questions
Is OpenActive only useful in the UK?
OpenActive originated in the UK and most current adopters are British, but the standard itself is open and global. International operators can and do publish OpenActive feeds. As AI activity-search rolls out globally, non-UK operators have a clean first-mover position.
Does this cost anything to implement?
If your booking system already supports OpenActive output, the cost is configuration only. If it does not, the cost is developer time to publish the feeds. The standard itself is open and free. Many operators recover the cost quickly through additional bookings from aggregators.
How do I know if my customers' AI agents will visit my site?
OpenActive feeds are typically consumed by aggregators rather than by agents hitting your site directly. So your customers' assistants find you via tools like ActiveLondon, OpenActive's data catalog, or general-purpose AI assistants that index those aggregators. Either way, the booking originates from your feed.
Will this matter in 2026 or is it years away?
It matters now. OpenActive has been live since 2017 with hundreds of operators publishing feeds. The AI assistant integration layer is the newer part, but the underlying ecosystem is established and already drives real bookings today.
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