diff --git a/virtualizarr/__init__.py b/virtualizarr/__init__.py
index f1e3dab0..bd70f834 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/__init__.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/__init__.py
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 from virtualizarr.manifests import ChunkManifest, ManifestArray  # type: ignore # noqa
 from virtualizarr.accessor import VirtualiZarrDatasetAccessor  # type: ignore # noqa
-from virtualizarr.backends import open_virtual_dataset  # noqa: F401
+from virtualizarr.backend import open_virtual_dataset  # noqa: F401
 
 from importlib.metadata import version as _version
 
diff --git a/virtualizarr/backends/__init__.py b/virtualizarr/backends/__init__.py
deleted file mode 100644
index 6441fad3..00000000
--- a/virtualizarr/backends/__init__.py
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1 +0,0 @@
-from virtualizarr.backends.api import open_virtual_dataset
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/virtualizarr/backends/api.py b/virtualizarr/backends/api.py
deleted file mode 100644
index 5572f779..00000000
--- a/virtualizarr/backends/api.py
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,256 +0,0 @@
-import warnings
-from collections.abc import Iterable, Mapping
-from enum import Enum, auto
-from pathlib import Path
-from typing import (
-    Any,
-    Optional,
-)
-
-from xarray import Dataset
-from xarray.core.indexes import Index
-
-from virtualizarr.manifests import ManifestArray
-from virtualizarr.utils import _FsspecFSFromFilepath
-
-
-class AutoName(Enum):
-    # Recommended by official Python docs for auto naming:
-    # https://docs.python.org/3/library/enum.html#using-automatic-values
-    def _generate_next_value_(name, start, count, last_values):
-        return name
-
-
-class FileType(AutoName):
-    netcdf3 = auto()
-    netcdf4 = auto()  # NOTE: netCDF4 is a subset of hdf5
-    hdf4 = auto()
-    hdf5 = auto()
-    grib = auto()
-    tiff = auto()
-    fits = auto()
-    zarr = auto()
-    dmrpp = auto()
-    zarr_v3 = auto()
-    kerchunk = auto()
-
-
-def automatically_determine_filetype(
-    *,
-    filepath: str,
-    reader_options: Optional[dict[str, Any]] = {},
-) -> FileType:
-    """
-    Attempt to automatically infer the correct reader for this filetype.
-
-    Uses magic bytes and file / directory suffixes.
-    """
-
-    # TODO this should ideally handle every filetype that we have a reader for, not just kerchunk
-
-    # TODO how do we handle kerchunk json / parquet here?
-    if Path(filepath).suffix == ".zarr":
-        # TODO we could imagine opening an existing zarr store, concatenating it, and writing a new virtual one...
-        raise NotImplementedError()
-
-    # Read magic bytes from local or remote file
-    fpath = _FsspecFSFromFilepath(
-        filepath=filepath, reader_options=reader_options
-    ).open_file()
-    magic_bytes = fpath.read(8)
-    fpath.close()
-
-    if magic_bytes.startswith(b"CDF"):
-        filetype = FileType.netcdf3
-    elif magic_bytes.startswith(b"\x0e\x03\x13\x01"):
-        raise NotImplementedError("HDF4 formatted files not supported")
-    elif magic_bytes.startswith(b"\x89HDF"):
-        filetype = FileType.hdf5
-    elif magic_bytes.startswith(b"GRIB"):
-        filetype = FileType.grib
-    elif magic_bytes.startswith(b"II*"):
-        filetype = FileType.tiff
-    elif magic_bytes.startswith(b"SIMPLE"):
-        filetype = FileType.fits
-    else:
-        raise NotImplementedError(
-            f"Unrecognised file based on header bytes: {magic_bytes}"
-        )
-
-    return filetype
-
-
-def open_virtual_dataset(
-    filepath: str,
-    *,
-    filetype: FileType | None = None,
-    group: str | None = None,
-    drop_variables: Iterable[str] | None = None,
-    loadable_variables: Iterable[str] | None = None,
-    decode_times: bool | None = None,
-    cftime_variables: Iterable[str] | None = None,
-    indexes: Mapping[str, Index] | None = None,
-    virtual_array_class=ManifestArray,
-    reader_options: Optional[dict] = None,
-) -> Dataset:
-    """
-    Open a file or store as an xarray Dataset wrapping virtualized zarr arrays.
-
-    No data variables will be loaded unless specified in the ``loadable_variables`` kwarg (in which case they will be xarray lazily indexed arrays).
-
-    Xarray indexes can optionally be created (the default behaviour). To avoid creating any xarray indexes pass ``indexes={}``.
-
-    Parameters
-    ----------
-    filepath : str, default None
-        File path to open as a set of virtualized zarr arrays.
-    filetype : FileType, default None
-        Type of file to be opened. Used to determine which kerchunk file format backend to use.
-        Can be one of {'netCDF3', 'netCDF4', 'HDF', 'TIFF', 'GRIB', 'FITS', 'zarr_v3', 'kerchunk'}.
-        If not provided will attempt to automatically infer the correct filetype from header bytes.
-    group : str, default is None
-        Path to the HDF5/netCDF4 group in the given file to open. Given as a str, supported by filetypes “netcdf4” and “hdf5”.
-    drop_variables: list[str], default is None
-        Variables in the file to drop before returning.
-    loadable_variables: list[str], default is None
-        Variables in the file to open as lazy numpy/dask arrays instead of instances of virtual_array_class.
-        Default is to open all variables as virtual arrays (i.e. ManifestArray).
-    decode_times: bool | None, default is None
-        Bool that is passed into Xarray's open_dataset. Allows time to be decoded into a datetime object.
-    indexes : Mapping[str, Index], default is None
-        Indexes to use on the returned xarray Dataset.
-        Default is None, which will read any 1D coordinate data to create in-memory Pandas indexes.
-        To avoid creating any indexes, pass indexes={}.
-    virtual_array_class
-        Virtual array class to use to represent the references to the chunks in each on-disk array.
-        Currently can only be ManifestArray, but once VirtualZarrArray is implemented the default should be changed to that.
-    reader_options: dict, default {}
-        Dict passed into Kerchunk file readers, to allow reading from remote filesystems.
-        Note: Each Kerchunk file reader has distinct arguments, so ensure reader_options match selected Kerchunk reader arguments.
-
-    Returns
-    -------
-    vds
-        An xarray Dataset containing instances of virtual_array_cls for each variable, or normal lazily indexed arrays for each variable in loadable_variables.
-    """
-
-    if cftime_variables is not None:
-        # It seems like stacklevel=2 is req to surface this warning.
-        warnings.warn(
-            "cftime_variables is deprecated and will be ignored. Pass decode_times=True and loadable_variables=['time'] to decode time values to datetime objects.",
-            DeprecationWarning,
-            stacklevel=2,
-        )
-
-    if drop_variables is None:
-        drop_variables = []
-    elif isinstance(drop_variables, str):
-        drop_variables = [drop_variables]
-    else:
-        drop_variables = list(drop_variables)
-    if loadable_variables is None:
-        loadable_variables = []
-    elif isinstance(loadable_variables, str):
-        loadable_variables = [loadable_variables]
-    else:
-        loadable_variables = list(loadable_variables)
-    common = set(drop_variables).intersection(set(loadable_variables))
-    if common:
-        raise ValueError(f"Cannot both load and drop variables {common}")
-
-    if virtual_array_class is not ManifestArray:
-        raise NotImplementedError()
-
-    if reader_options is None:
-        reader_options = {}
-
-    if filetype is not None:
-        # if filetype is user defined, convert to FileType
-        filetype = FileType(filetype)
-    else:
-        filetype = automatically_determine_filetype(
-            filepath=filepath, reader_options=reader_options
-        )
-
-    # TODO define these through a mapping to registered pluggable entrypoints instead
-    match filetype.name.lower():
-        case "kerchunk":
-            from virtualizarr.readers.kerchunk import KerchunkVirtualBackend
-
-            return KerchunkVirtualBackend.open_virtual_dataset(filepath, reader_options)
-
-        case "zarr_v3":
-            from virtualizarr.readers.zarr_v3 import ZarrV3VirtualBackend
-
-            return ZarrV3VirtualBackend.open_virtual_dataset(
-                storepath=filepath,
-                drop_variables=drop_variables,
-                indexes=indexes,
-            )
-
-        case "dmrpp":
-            from virtualizarr.readers.dmrpp import DMRPPVirtualBackend
-
-            return DMRPPVirtualBackend.open_virtual_dataset(
-                filepath,
-                drop_variables=drop_variables,
-                loadable_variables=loadable_variables,
-                indexes=indexes,
-                reader_options=reader_options,
-            )
-
-        case "netcdf3":
-            from virtualizarr.readers.netcdf3 import NetCDF3VirtualBackend
-
-            return NetCDF3VirtualBackend.open_virtual_dataset(
-                filepath,
-                group=group,
-                drop_variables=drop_variables,
-                loadable_variables=loadable_variables,
-                indexes=indexes,
-                reader_options=reader_options,
-            )
-
-        case "hdf5" | "netcdf4":
-            from virtualizarr.readers.hdf5 import HDF5VirtualBackend
-
-            return HDF5VirtualBackend.open_virtual_dataset(
-                filepath,
-                group=group,
-                drop_variables=drop_variables,
-                loadable_variables=loadable_variables,
-                indexes=indexes,
-                reader_options=reader_options,
-            )
-
-        case "grib":
-            # TODO Grib files should be handled as a DataTree object
-            # see https://github.com/TomNicholas/VirtualiZarr/issues/11
-            raise NotImplementedError(f"Unsupported file type: {filetype}")
-
-        case "tiff":
-            from virtualizarr.readers.tiff import TIFFVirtualBackend
-
-            return TIFFVirtualBackend.open_virtual_dataset(
-                filepath,
-                group=group,
-                drop_variables=drop_variables,
-                loadable_variables=loadable_variables,
-                indexes=indexes,
-                reader_options=reader_options,
-            )
-
-        case "fits":
-            from virtualizarr.readers.fits import FITSVirtualBackend
-
-            return FITSVirtualBackend.open_virtual_dataset(
-                filepath,
-                group=group,
-                drop_variables=drop_variables,
-                loadable_variables=loadable_variables,
-                indexes=indexes,
-                reader_options=reader_options,
-            )
-        case _:
-            raise NotImplementedError(f"Unsupported file type: {filetype.name}")
-
diff --git a/virtualizarr/backends/common.py b/virtualizarr/backends/common.py
deleted file mode 100644
index 46cfab22..00000000
--- a/virtualizarr/backends/common.py
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,194 +0,0 @@
-import os
-import warnings
-from collections.abc import Iterable, Mapping, MutableMapping
-from abc import ABC
-from io import BufferedIOBase
-from typing import (
-    Any,
-    Hashable,
-    Optional,
-    cast,
-    TYPE_CHECKING,
-)
-
-import xarray as xr
-from xarray import Dataset
-from xarray.backends import AbstractDataStore, BackendArray
-from xarray.core.indexes import Index, PandasIndex
-from xarray.core.variable import IndexVariable, Variable
-
-from virtualizarr.manifests import ManifestArray
-from virtualizarr.utils import _FsspecFSFromFilepath
-
-XArrayOpenT = str | os.PathLike[Any] | BufferedIOBase | AbstractDataStore
-
-if TYPE_CHECKING:
-    try:
-        from xarray import DataTree
-    except ImportError:
-        DataTree = Any
-
-
-class ManifestBackendArray(ManifestArray, BackendArray):
-    """Using this prevents xarray from wrapping the KerchunkArray in ExplicitIndexingAdapter etc."""
-
-    ...
-
-
-# TODO move these out into a backend/utils.py module? Or readers/common.py?
-def open_loadable_vars_and_indexes(
-    filepath: str,
-    loadable_variables,
-    reader_options,
-    drop_variables,
-    indexes,
-    group,
-    decode_times,
-) -> tuple[Mapping[str, Variable], Mapping[str, Index]]:
-    """
-    Open selected variables and indexes using xarray.
-
-    Relies on xr.open_dataset and its auto-detection of filetypes to find the correct installed backend.
-    """
-
-    # TODO get rid of this if?
-    if indexes is None or len(loadable_variables) > 0:
-        # TODO we are reading a bunch of stuff we know we won't need here, e.g. all of the data variables...
-        # TODO it would also be nice if we could somehow consolidate this with the reading of the kerchunk references
-        # TODO really we probably want a dedicated xarray backend that iterates over all variables only once
-        fpath = _FsspecFSFromFilepath(
-            filepath=filepath, reader_options=reader_options
-        ).open_file()
-
-        # fpath can be `Any` thanks to fsspec.filesystem(...).open() returning Any.
-        # We'll (hopefully safely) cast it to what xarray is expecting, but this might let errors through.
-
-        ds = xr.open_dataset(
-            cast(XArrayOpenT, fpath),
-            drop_variables=drop_variables,
-            group=group,
-            decode_times=decode_times,
-        )
-
-        if indexes is None:
-            warnings.warn(
-                "Specifying `indexes=None` will create in-memory pandas indexes for each 1D coordinate, but concatenation of ManifestArrays backed by pandas indexes is not yet supported (see issue #18)."
-                "You almost certainly want to pass `indexes={}` to `open_virtual_dataset` instead."
-            )
-
-            # add default indexes by reading data from file
-            indexes = {name: index for name, index in ds.xindexes.items()}
-        elif indexes != {}:
-            # TODO allow manual specification of index objects
-            raise NotImplementedError()
-        else:
-            indexes = dict(**indexes)  # for type hinting: to allow mutation
-
-        # TODO we should drop these earlier by using drop_variables
-        loadable_vars = {
-            str(name): var
-            for name, var in ds.variables.items()
-            if name in loadable_variables
-        }
-
-        # if we only read the indexes we can just close the file right away as nothing is lazy
-        if loadable_vars == {}:
-            ds.close()
-    else:
-        loadable_vars = {}
-        indexes = {}
-
-    return loadable_vars, indexes
-
-
-def construct_virtual_dataset(
-    virtual_vars,
-    loadable_vars,
-    indexes,
-    coord_names,
-    attrs,
-) -> Dataset:
-    """Construct a virtual Datset from consistuent parts."""
-
-    vars = {**virtual_vars, **loadable_vars}
-
-    data_vars, coords = separate_coords(vars, indexes, coord_names)
-
-    vds = xr.Dataset(
-        data_vars,
-        coords=coords,
-        # indexes={},  # TODO should be added in a later version of xarray
-        attrs=attrs,
-    )
-
-    # TODO we should probably also use vds.set_close() to tell xarray how to close the file we opened
-
-    return vds
-
-
-def separate_coords(
-    vars: Mapping[str, xr.Variable],
-    indexes: MutableMapping[str, Index],
-    coord_names: Iterable[str] | None = None,
-) -> tuple[dict[str, xr.Variable], xr.Coordinates]:
-    """
-    Try to generate a set of coordinates that won't cause xarray to automatically build a pandas.Index for the 1D coordinates.
-
-    Currently requires this function as a workaround unless xarray PR #8124 is merged.
-
-    Will also preserve any loaded variables and indexes it is passed.
-    """
-
-    if coord_names is None:
-        coord_names = []
-
-    # split data and coordinate variables (promote dimension coordinates)
-    data_vars = {}
-    coord_vars: dict[
-        str, tuple[Hashable, Any, dict[Any, Any], dict[Any, Any]] | xr.Variable
-    ] = {}
-    for name, var in vars.items():
-        if name in coord_names or var.dims == (name,):
-            # use workaround to avoid creating IndexVariables described here https://github.com/pydata/xarray/pull/8107#discussion_r1311214263
-            if len(var.dims) == 1:
-                dim1d, *_ = var.dims
-                coord_vars[name] = (dim1d, var.data, var.attrs, var.encoding)
-
-                if isinstance(var, IndexVariable):
-                    # unless variable actually already is a loaded IndexVariable,
-                    # in which case we need to keep it and add the corresponding indexes explicitly
-                    coord_vars[str(name)] = var
-                    # TODO this seems suspect - will it handle datetimes?
-                    indexes[name] = PandasIndex(var, dim1d)
-            else:
-                coord_vars[name] = var
-        else:
-            data_vars[name] = var
-
-    coords = xr.Coordinates(coord_vars, indexes=indexes)
-
-    return data_vars, coords
-
-
-class VirtualBackend(ABC):
-    def open_virtual_dataset(
-        path: str,
-        group: str | None = None,
-        drop_variables: Iterable[str] | None = None,
-        loadable_variables: Iterable[str] | None = None,
-        decode_times: bool | None = None,
-        indexes: Mapping[str, Index] | None = None,
-        reader_options: Optional[dict] = None,
-    ) -> Dataset:
-        raise NotImplementedError()
-
-    def open_virtual_datatree(
-        path: str,
-        group: str | None = None,
-        drop_variables: Iterable[str] | None = None,
-        loadable_variables: Iterable[str] | None = None,
-        decode_times: bool | None = None,
-        indexes: Mapping[str, Index] | None = None,
-        reader_options: Optional[dict] = None,
-    ) -> "DataTree":
-        raise NotImplementedError()
diff --git a/virtualizarr/readers/dmrpp.py b/virtualizarr/readers/dmrpp.py
index f54e7b26..f903db0c 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/readers/dmrpp.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/readers/dmrpp.py
@@ -9,8 +9,8 @@
 import xarray as xr
 from xarray.core.indexes import Index
 
-from virtualizarr.backends.common import VirtualBackend
 from virtualizarr.manifests import ChunkManifest, ManifestArray
+from virtualizarr.readers.common import VirtualBackend
 from virtualizarr.types import ChunkKey
 from virtualizarr.utils import _FsspecFSFromFilepath
 from virtualizarr.zarr import ZArray
diff --git a/virtualizarr/readers/fits.py b/virtualizarr/readers/fits.py
index 8bc1a038..49a1e7b6 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/readers/fits.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/readers/fits.py
@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@
 from xarray import Dataset
 from xarray.core.indexes import Index
 
-from virtualizarr.backends.common import (
+from virtualizarr.readers.common import (
     VirtualBackend,
     construct_virtual_dataset,
     open_loadable_vars_and_indexes,
diff --git a/virtualizarr/readers/hdf5.py b/virtualizarr/readers/hdf5.py
index ca628359..854ae128 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/readers/hdf5.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/readers/hdf5.py
@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@
 from xarray import Dataset
 from xarray.core.indexes import Index
 
-from virtualizarr.backends.common import (
+from virtualizarr.readers.common import (
     VirtualBackend,
     construct_virtual_dataset,
     open_loadable_vars_and_indexes,
diff --git a/virtualizarr/readers/kerchunk.py b/virtualizarr/readers/kerchunk.py
index 77a2f2fe..46c35ef9 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/readers/kerchunk.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/readers/kerchunk.py
@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@
 import ujson
 from xarray import Dataset
 
-from virtualizarr.backends.common import VirtualBackend
+from virtualizarr.readers.common import VirtualBackend
 from virtualizarr.translators.kerchunk import dataset_from_kerchunk_refs
 from virtualizarr.types.kerchunk import (
     KerchunkStoreRefs,
diff --git a/virtualizarr/readers/netcdf3.py b/virtualizarr/readers/netcdf3.py
index 03d783ab..30dda493 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/readers/netcdf3.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/readers/netcdf3.py
@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@
 from xarray import Dataset
 from xarray.core.indexes import Index
 
-from virtualizarr.backends.common import (
+from virtualizarr.readers.common import (
     VirtualBackend,
     construct_virtual_dataset,
     open_loadable_vars_and_indexes,
diff --git a/virtualizarr/readers/tiff.py b/virtualizarr/readers/tiff.py
index 53659f93..cffdb0db 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/readers/tiff.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/readers/tiff.py
@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@
 from xarray import Dataset
 from xarray.core.indexes import Index
 
-from virtualizarr.backends.common import (
+from virtualizarr.readers.common import (
     VirtualBackend,
     construct_virtual_dataset,
     open_loadable_vars_and_indexes,
diff --git a/virtualizarr/readers/zarr_v3.py b/virtualizarr/readers/zarr_v3.py
index 29787246..9cfa7e83 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/readers/zarr_v3.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/readers/zarr_v3.py
@@ -8,8 +8,8 @@
 from xarray.core.indexes import Index
 from xarray.core.variable import Variable
 
-from virtualizarr.backends.common import VirtualBackend, separate_coords
 from virtualizarr.manifests import ChunkManifest, ManifestArray
+from virtualizarr.readers.common import VirtualBackend, separate_coords
 from virtualizarr.zarr import ZArray
 
 
diff --git a/virtualizarr/tests/test_backends.py b/virtualizarr/tests/test_backend.py
similarity index 99%
rename from virtualizarr/tests/test_backends.py
rename to virtualizarr/tests/test_backend.py
index 14feaea2..43a6bbd8 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/tests/test_backends.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/tests/test_backend.py
@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@
 from xarray.core.indexes import Index
 
 from virtualizarr import open_virtual_dataset
-from virtualizarr.backends.api import FileType, automatically_determine_filetype
+from virtualizarr.backend import FileType, automatically_determine_filetype
 from virtualizarr.manifests import ManifestArray
 from virtualizarr.tests import (
     has_astropy,
diff --git a/virtualizarr/tests/test_writers/test_zarr.py b/virtualizarr/tests/test_writers/test_zarr.py
index 91b0a707..67af401a 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/tests/test_writers/test_zarr.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/tests/test_writers/test_zarr.py
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@
 from xarray import Dataset
 
 from virtualizarr import ManifestArray, open_virtual_dataset
-from virtualizarr.backends.api import FileType
+from virtualizarr.backend import FileType
 from virtualizarr.manifests.manifest import ChunkManifest
 from virtualizarr.readers.zarr_v3 import metadata_from_zarr_json
 from virtualizarr.writers.zarr import dataset_to_zarr
diff --git a/virtualizarr/translators/kerchunk.py b/virtualizarr/translators/kerchunk.py
index 7d642c9e..e3b0530d 100644
--- a/virtualizarr/translators/kerchunk.py
+++ b/virtualizarr/translators/kerchunk.py
@@ -4,8 +4,8 @@
 from xarray.core.indexes import Index
 from xarray.core.variable import Variable
 
-from virtualizarr.backends.common import separate_coords
 from virtualizarr.manifests import ChunkManifest, ManifestArray
+from virtualizarr.readers.common import separate_coords
 from virtualizarr.types.kerchunk import (
     KerchunkArrRefs,
     KerchunkStoreRefs,