r/PublicApp

Historical options contract data is now live on the Public API. Full chain history. OHLCV bars on individual contracts. Historical quotes with bid/ask. Same API key you're already using for live execution.

Wanted to break down what this actually unlocks for anyone building systematic options strategies.

What shipped:

• Full chain history — pull what the options chain looked like on any past date, not just today's snapshot
• OHLCV bars on individual contracts — track how a specific strike traded over its life
• Historical bid/ask quotes — model realistic fills instead of midpoint fantasy math

What you can actually build now:

IV surface reconstruction. With historical chain data you can reconstruct the implied volatility surface at any point in time. Study how IV skew behaved into earnings, how the term structure shifted around FOMC, how put skew spiked during selloffs. Historical IV behavior is the foundation of any real options edge.

Realistic backtesting. Most retail options backtests use end-of-day midpoints as fill prices. With historical bid/ask you can model slippage properly. The difference between a backtest that uses mids and one that accounts for realistic fills can swing 30-40% of your apparent edge. It matters.

IV rank and percentile — computed from your own data. Both require historical IV to calculate correctly. Previously you had to source this from a separate provider or trust someone else's pre-computed number. Now you can derive it yourself from the same data source you're executing against.

IV crush quantification. If you're selling premium into earnings, you want to know how much IV collapses post-announcement on specific names, historically. Average IV going in vs. the morning after. Which names crush hardest. That analysis requires historical chain data — and now you can run it on your actual trading universe.

Put skew analysis. 25-delta put IV vs. ATM IV tracked historically. Is today's skew elevated relative to where it's been? Is the market paying up for tail risk or is it cheap? These filters separate systematic traders from people just selling premium into any environment.

Strategy backtesting with real contract prices. Wheel, 45 DTE strangle, 0DTE credit spread — you can now test entry and exit rules against historical data using actual options P&L, not just underlying price movement.

Why the same API key matters.

The execution/research split is the friction point that makes most algo setups messy. Polygon or CBOE for historical data, something else for live data, your broker's API for execution. Three systems, three auth flows, three schemas to normalize.

When your historical research data and your live execution data come from the same source with the same schema, your backtests are actually testing what your live system will see. That's a materially stronger foundation.

This is on top of what was already live — real-time chains, Greeks on the chain endpoint, preflight for multileg orders, cancel/replace, and the MCP server for agentic workflows. Historical data was the missing piece for anything signal-driven.

Docs at public.com/api/docs. Happy to answer questions in the comments!

Are there any plans in the future to increase the IRA match to 2% or 3% to match Robinhood?

I know it’s difficult for a smaller company to match another company like Robinhood but is that a possibility in the future? Even if it’s apart of the Public Premium.

Lastly, does Public have a phone number?
Besides the IRA match, the main issue keeping me on edge is only having live chat in the app and it isn’t 24/7 or even a phone number to call. Unless I’m mistaken.

This app advertised itself as free trading since the beginning but what they don't tell you now is an auto invest triggers a $0.49 commission now which adds up fast if you do a lot of micro trades. I'd stay away. Other apps are still truly free.

From switching to Public from Robinhood, it would be great to see my portfolio and the performance quickly when i turn on my phone. Cool little feature that has no downside. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, customize your lock screen on IOS with Robinhood downloaded, click at the top by the time you will see their widget when you scroll down. Very basic idea but pretty cool.

Im curious about the bond account that Public is advertising. Im new to bonds but from my understanding, you can just buy bonds using your normal brokerage, right? So why do you need a separate bond account?

Have been a big fan of public and would like to link them with my finance tracker which uses plaid, so just curious if there was any rough timeline/quarter by which we can expect the plaid connector. Thanks!

Hello,

New to Public and wanted to ask if anyone was using the AI chat. Has anyone been able to verify the data and is it any better than just using Claude or chatGPT? Thanks!

I’m currently debating opening an account between public and fidelity any recommendations I like a lot of the features but public has a lot of stuff behind a paywall I was wondering if they have any promotions for new accounts

I have positions managed thru Autopilot. My Agent sees the positions and thinks they're mine. I can take a snapshot and tell it to leave those positions alone. My concern is if he adds positions while at work. Also when I buy stocks it mixes with my autopilot too. Is there a way to show Claude the stocks purchased thru Autopilot are off limits? Possibly a skill I can make to do this?

Anyone else out there trading with Agents yet? I know PCS and hardware. I don't know too much about AI. Looking for fellow users to try and get the most out of this tech.

We just updated our Python SDK, CLI, MCP server, and agent skills to include market data endpoints — specifically historical bars (1-min to 1-day, 5 years) and live quotes.

For anyone building on their API this is a meaningful update. Previously you had to pull market data from a separate source and route orders through Public. Now the data and execution layer are in the same SDK.

Practical use case: your Python strategy pulls historical bars to backtest, switches to live quotes at market open, and routes orders — all through one API key. Or if you're running MCP with Claude, the agent now sees live prices before constructing an order.

https://preview.redd.it/wbxk36rvl41h1.png?width=2444&format=png&auto=webp&s=c1f157f9d8b273eb3456eae77eee5e2e1400e84f

Docs at public.com/api/docs if you want to dig in.

DM me happy to get you moving on setups!

I really like generated assets because of how similar it is to m1 finance pies. The only thing I dislike is that the minimum deposit is 1k. That doesn't really make any sense to me because you can essentially create the same collection of assets on m1 and deposit like $100 or less into it whenever you want. It really sucks because 1k minimum deposit means that its a feature more catered to people with large cash reserves rather than the average investor who has a little extra cash after his paycheck and wants to put it in his pie/collection. It seems kinda contradictory to Public's mission of wanting to make investing more accessible to regular people rather than the ultra wealthy. Hopefully they can read this and consider changing their minimum limits. Otherwise great tool.

Can you do anything with the agents, like have it scan the market, buy/sell shares, buy/sell options, give you a list of all AI stocks, etc? Like can the agent do anything a human could do on this app? Secondly, is there an mcp server where you can connect your own openclaw/Hermes agent to? That way I can ask my personal agent that i speak to daily on openclaw to handle my assets. Finally, and MOST IMPORTANTLY, how safe is this tool? Agent tools like openclaw are super cool, but have been noted as huge security risks if not careful. Im scared that my agent could get hacked through some malicious library and sell all my stocks, transfer a bunch of funds, send my funds to another fake account, etc.

Also, any info on when we can get access?

Had anyone else experienced terrible response time from the “award winning” priority support on the public app?