AI Web Scraping

Apify

Apify is a full-stack web scraping and data extraction platform for building and running scalable Actors that collect live web data.

What is Apify?

Apify is a platform for web scraping, data extraction, and automation that lets users run and publish scalable Actors to collect live data from websites and integrate it with external tools and workflows.

Apify vs Similar AI Tools

Pricing ModelFree, PaidFreeFree, FreemiumFree, Free Trial, Paid
Free Credits
Key Features
  • Prebuilt and custom scraping Actors
  • Support for websites, social platforms, maps, and product data
  • API access for automation and integration
  • SPF Flattener - resolves SPF includes and produces a flattened TXT record
  • DNS Twister - generates and inspects lookalike domain permutations
  • Is This a Homoglyph? - analyzes IDN, punycode, and visually confusable characters
  • Scrape any URL to clean markdown or rendered HTML
  • Crawl entire websites via sitemap or full-site crawl
  • Extract structured data defined by JSON schema
  • Extract structured data to a schema you define
  • Convert pages to clean Markdown
  • Run cited multi-source research in a single API call
Pros
  • Large library of ready-made Actors
  • Built for scalable scraping and automation
  • Free to use
  • No registration required for basic tools
  • Comprehensive data extraction in one API
  • Simple integration with SDKs and documentation
  • No need to host or manage browsers
  • Token-efficient: uses accessibility tree instead of screenshots
Cons
  • Advanced scraping may require technical setup
  • Pricing details are not fully specified on the homepage
  • Limited to DNS-related functionalities
  • Requires some technical knowledge of DNS
  • Free tier has limited credits and rate limits
  • Overage costs can add up at scale
  • Stateless retries can lead to duplicate actions on writes
  • No built-in session management for authenticated workflows
Best For
  • Developers building data pipelines
  • Teams needing live web data for AI
  • Developers
  • Network engineers
  • AI agents needing live web context
  • Developers building onboarding or enrichment features
  • Developers building AI agents that need live web data
  • Teams automating browser interactions without infrastructure overhead

How to use Apify?

  1. 1Choose or build an Actor for the website or data source you need.
  2. 2Configure inputs such as URLs, search queries, filters, or schedules.
  3. 3Run the Actor manually or via API, then monitor execution and results.
  4. 4Export the extracted data or connect it to tools like Sheets, Slack, GitHub, or other pipelines.
  5. 5Scale usage by scheduling runs, automating workflows, or publishing your own Actors.

Apify Key Features

  • Prebuilt and custom scraping Actors
  • Support for websites, social platforms, maps, and product data
  • API access for automation and integration
  • Scheduled and monitored runs
  • Data export and workflow integrations
  • Scalable cloud execution infrastructure
  • Actor marketplace with 35,000+ ready-made tools
  • Publishing and monetization for creators

Apify Use Cases

  • Competitive intelligence
  • Lead generation
  • Product research
  • Social media monitoring
  • Google Maps business data extraction
  • AI training data collection
  • RAG and LLM content ingestion
  • Automated website monitoring

Apify Pricing & Free Credits

Apify currently operates on a Free, Paid model.

Free TierFree Credits

Free

Free plan available

The site highlights no upfront costs for publishing Actors and includes free platform credits for new creators.

Paid Plans

Paid usage

Usage-based

Customers pay for compute resources when running Actors; billing, taxes, and invoicing are handled by the platform.

Free

Free plan available

The site highlights no upfront costs for publishing Actors and includes free platform credits for new creators.

Paid usage

Usage-based

Customers pay for compute resources when running Actors; billing, taxes, and invoicing are handled by the platform.

Apify Pros & Cons

Pros

  • Large library of ready-made Actors
  • Built for scalable scraping and automation
  • Easy integration with APIs and external tools
  • Supports scheduling, monitoring, and exports
  • Useful for AI data pipelines and research

Cons

  • Advanced scraping may require technical setup
  • Pricing details are not fully specified on the homepage
  • Best fit is narrower if you need only simple one-off scraping

What is Apify best for?

  • Developers building data pipelines
  • Teams needing live web data for AI
  • Growth and research teams
  • Users who need scalable web scraping
  • Creators who want to publish and monetize scraping tools

Apify FAQ

Top free alternatives to Apify

D

A collection of AI-powered DNS skills and tools for domain operations, including SPF flattening, homoglyph detection, and domain lookalike analysis.

Free
Context.dev logo

Web scraping and crawl API that provides markdown, HTML, brand data, images, and structured data extraction for AI agents.

Free
Tabstack by Mozilla logo

Extract web data and automate browsers via a single API call, no scraper required.

Free
Firecrawl logo

Firecrawl is an API that enables AI systems to search, scrape, and interact with the web at scale.

Free
Browse AI logo

Browse AI is a no-code AI web scraping and monitoring platform for extracting, tracking, and automating website data.

Free
Gologin logo

Gologin is an antidetect browser for managing multiple accounts with separate fingerprints, proxies, and team access from one device.

Free
Firecrawl logo

Firecrawl is an API that helps AI systems search, scrape, crawl, and interact with live web pages at scale.

Free

Best alternatives AI Tools to Apify

D

A collection of AI-powered DNS skills and tools for domain operations, including SPF flattening, homoglyph detection, and domain lookalike analysis.

Free
Context.dev logo

Web scraping and crawl API that provides markdown, HTML, brand data, images, and structured data extraction for AI agents.

Free
Tabstack by Mozilla logo

Extract web data and automate browsers via a single API call, no scraper required.

Free
F

A CLI tool that converts web pages into compact text accessibility trees for LLMs to automate browser interactions efficiently.

Selector Forge logo

A browser extension that uses AI to generate and verify reliable CSS and XPath selectors for web automation and testing.

Firecrawl logo

Firecrawl is an API that enables AI systems to search, scrape, and interact with the web at scale.

Free
browse.sh logo

Browse.sh is an open catalog of browser automation skills for AI agents, providing a CLI to manage and execute automated tasks on websites with optimized selectors.

Vercel Security Checkpoint logo

A Vercel security checkpoint page blocking access to the requested site content.