LinkedIn is unique because it strictly separates Personal Profiles (Members) from Organization Pages (Companies). The API treats them very differently, and this affects analytics significantly.
Quirks & Gotchas
Personal vs. Organization
This is the biggest source of confusion.
- Personal Profile (Member): Limited API. Cannot import post history. Limited analytics. No profile views data.
- Organization (Company Page): Full API power. Richer analytics. Supports historical import. Has page view data.
The URN Nightmare
LinkedIn uses “URNs” (Uniform Resource Names) to identify everything.
- Organization:
urn:li:organization:12345
- Person:
urn:li:person:abcde
If you are constructing raw text mentions, you need to use this format. Our API handles basic text automatically, but if you’re getting fancy, keep this in mind.
Video max size is 2 GB (not 200 MB - that was an old API limitation). Documents must be PDF format, max 100 MB.
See Platform Limits for the full breakdown.
Analytics
For general analytics concepts (refresh rates, data retention, what “Returns 0” means), see the Analytics Overview.
Profile Analytics
Personal (Member)
Period: Rolling window (30 days).
| Metric | Description | Note |
|---|
impressions | Total content views | |
impressionsUnique | Unique content views | |
views | - | Returns 0 (LinkedIn doesn’t provide views for personal accounts) |
viewsUnique | - | Returns 0 |
likes | Total likes | |
comments | Total comments | |
postCount | - | Returns 0 (not provided by LinkedIn API) |
followers | Connections/Followers | |
following | - | Returns 0 (not provided by LinkedIn API) |
Organization (Company)
Period: Rolling window (30 days).
| Metric | Description | Note |
|---|
impressions | Total content views | |
impressionsUnique | Unique content views | |
views | Page Views | Available for Orgs only! |
viewsUnique | Unique page views | |
likes | Total likes | |
comments | Total comments | |
postCount | - | Returns 0 (not provided by LinkedIn API) |
followers | Followers | |
following | - | Returns 0 (not provided by LinkedIn API) |
Post Analytics
Personal Posts
Period: Rolling window (30 days).
| Metric | Description | Note |
|---|
impressions | View count | |
impressionsUnique | Unique view count | |
views | Video views | Video posts only |
viewsUnique | Unique video views | Video posts only |
likes | Reactions | |
comments | Comments | |
shares | Reposts | |
Organization Posts
Period: Rolling window (30 days).
Only recent posts. Organization analytics only cover posts published within the last 30 days. Posts authored by members (not the organization/brand itself) are excluded from organization analytics.
| Metric | Description | Note |
|---|
impressions | View count | |
impressionsUnique | Unique view count | |
views | - | Returns 0 (not provided for individual org posts) |
viewsUnique | - | Returns 0 |
likes | Reactions | |
comments | Comments | |
shares | Reposts | |
saves | - | Returns 0 (not provided by LinkedIn API) |
Quirks
- Personal accounts do NOT have views analytics for profiles - only organizations get page views.
- Organization accounts have page views for profile analytics but NOT for individual posts. Yes, it’s confusing.
- Post count and following count are not provided through the LinkedIn API for either account type.
- Organization post analytics only include posts from the last 30 days.
