Apify
Apify: The largest marketplace of pre-built web scraping and data extraction tools for AI
Apify's massive Actor marketplace (60k+ tools) is its standout feature, letting you scrape almost any site with pre-built, community-verified Actors. The free tier ($5 credit) is great for testing, and the pay-as-you-go compute model scales predictably. For AI-driven data collection, the MCP server and LangChain/LlamaIndex integrations give it an edge over generic scraping tools. However, it's cloud-only and requires some technical comfort with APIs and configurations. If you need on-premise scraping, consider alternatives like Scrapy or self-hosted Crawlee.
Verified 6d ago · liveness 78/100 · cite: rightaichoice.com/tools/apify
- Data scientists building LLM training or RAG pipelines
- Developers creating AI agents that need real-time web information
- Businesses automating lead generation and competitor monitoring
- Market researchers scraping social media and e-commerce data
- Complete beginners with zero coding knowledge
- Users needing a point-and-click scraper with no setup
- Projects requiring on-premise deployment
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Skip Apify if you need on-premise scraping, have a very limited budget (under $5), or are a non-technical user who wants a simple point-and-click scraper without any setup or coding.
Going past the free $5 credit requires a paid plan or pay-as-you-go, and compute units add up fast on large jobs.
Apify's pricing suits developers and teams that need flexibility and scale, with plans from $0 to $999/month. Compared to simpler tools like ScraperAPI (starting at $29/mo) or Zyte (from $39/mo), Apify's free tier and per-run pricing can be more cost-effective for small projects, but for heavy use, dedicated plans may be pricier than alternatives.
In short
Apify — Apify: The largest marketplace of pre-built web scraping and data extraction tools for AI. Best for Data scientists building LLM training or RAG pipelines, Developers creating AI agents that need real-time web information, Businesses automating lead generation and competitor monitoring. Free to start; paid plans from $29/mo.
What's new in Apify
Checked 6 days agoAcross the latest 3 updates: 3 feature updates.
New Apify AI beta is live
Natural language search now finds the right Actor for your scraping task in seconds.
We're live on x402
AI agents can now run Actors and pay per run using the x402 protocol.
MCP server for AI agents
Give your AI access to Actors via the Model Context Protocol, enabling direct integration.
What people actually say about Apify — is it worth it?
We ran a structured research pass across product reviews, community discussions, and post-purchase forum threads to surface the patterns vendors won't publish themselves. Below: the recurring strengths, the hidden costs people mention most, and the cohort that consistently regrets adopting this tool.
63 mentions across 4 sources (Hacker News, Product Hunt, Bluesky, Lemmy) · researched Jul 3, 2026.
- +46,000+ pre-built Actors for instant data extraction.
- +Cloud execution removes infrastructure management overhead.
- +Pay-as-you-go pricing with $0.001/result for many Actors.
- +MCP server directly integrates with AI agents like Claude.
- +Strong integration with n8n, Make.com, and OpenRouter.
- −Costs can escalate quickly for high-volume scraping.
- −Anti-blocking still fails against sophisticated bot mitigation.
- −Custom Actor development requires significant developer skill.
- −Free tier compute limits are restrictive for production work.
- −Search and discovery of Actors could be improved.
- • Running long or memory-heavy Actors can consume credits faster than expected
- • Residential proxies incur additional surcharges per GB
- • Data transfer out to third-party services may incur egress fees
Viability Score
How well maintained and how widely used is Apify? Built from what the vendor actually publishes (docs, changelog, tutorials, integrations, pricing), whether the site is live, and how much real users discuss it. How we calculate this
Last calculated: August 2026
How we score →Key Features
- Browse and use 60,507 pre-built Actors for any web data job
- Natural language Actor discovery with Apify AI beta
- MCP server to give AI agents direct access to Actors
- x402 protocol for agents to run Actors and pay per run
- Serverless Actor execution with pay-as-you-go compute units
- Anti-blocking with rotating proxies and browser fingerprinting
- Built-in data storage: key-value store, dataset, request queue
- Schedule runs and trigger via API or webhook
- Integrate with LangChain and LlamaIndex for AI pipelines
- Open-source Crawlee library for custom scrapers
- Support for Playwright, Puppeteer, Selenium, Scrapy, and Cheerio
- Monetize your code by publishing Actors
- Pre-built Actors for TikTok, Instagram, Google Maps, Facebook, and e-commerce
- Cloud deployment with monitoring and alerting
- Integration with Zapier, Make, n8n, and other automation tools
About Apify
Apify is a cloud-based platform that hosts over 60,000 pre-built 'Actors' — serverless programs for web scraping, data extraction, and browser automation. You can find and run an Actor for almost any website, from TikTok and Instagram to Google Maps and e-commerce sites, without managing your own scraping infrastructure. Apify handles anti-blocking via rotating proxies and browser fingerprinting, provides built-in storage for results, and lets you schedule runs and trigger them via API or webhook. It integrates tightly with the AI ecosystem: there's an MCP server so AI agents can use Actors directly, and integrations with LangChain and LlamaIndex. You can also build custom scrapers using the open-source Crawlee library (Python, JavaScript, or TypeScript) or monetize your own Actors. Apify is aimed at developers, data scientists, and businesses that need structured web data for AI training, lead generation, competitor monitoring, or market research, and prefer a managed cloud solution over rolling their own scraping stack.
Behind the Verdict
Apify is a powerhouse for developers and data teams that need reliable, scalable web data extraction without building infrastructure from scratch. The marketplace is its killer feature—you can find Actors for nearly any site, from social media to e-commerce, and start scraping in minutes. The platform abstracts away proxy management, browser fingerprinting, and execution, which saves a lot of time. Strengths: 1) The sheer number of pre-built Actors (60k+) means you rarely have to build from scratch. 2) The MCP server integration is forward-thinking—AI agents can now call Actors directly, which is a huge time-saver for teams building agentic workflows. 3) The pay-as-you-go model is transparent and scales with usage. Weaknesses: 1) It's cloud-only—no on-prem option (though Crawlee is open-source). 2) The free tier is just $5 of credit, which is enough for a few small runs but not much else. 3) There's a learning curve—you'll need to understand Actors, compute units, and the API to get the most out of it. 4) For large-scale scraping, costs can add up quickly (compute units + storage + proxies). Fits: Developers building AI training datasets, RAG pipelines, or lead-gen tools; agencies doing competitor monitoring; startups needing quick web data extraction. Doesn't fit: Non-technical users who want a point-and-click scraper; teams with strict data residency requirements that mandate on-prem; low-budget projects where $5 won't cover the data you need.
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Real-world workflow fit
Concrete scenarios for the personas Apify actually fits — and what changes day-one when you adopt it.
You need to crawl a website and extract content in Markdown for a RAG pipeline. You use the Website Content Crawler Actor, configure it with the target URL, and run it. The output is stored in a dataset, which you then pull via API to feed into LangChain.
Outcome: You get clean, structured Markdown data in minutes, ready for indexing, without writing a single scraper.
You need a list of potential leads from Google Maps for your local business outreach. You use the Google Maps Scraper Actor, input your search terms (e.g., 'plumbers in Austin'), and run it. You export the results to a CSV, which you then import into your CRM.
Outcome: You have a targeted list of leads with contact details, addresses, and ratings, saving hours of manual data collection.
You're building an AI agent that needs to answer questions about current social media trends. You configure the Apify MCP server and give your agent access to the TikTok Scraper Actor. When a user asks about viral videos, the agent calls the Actor directly and gets real-time data.
Outcome: Your agent can now pull live web data on demand, making it significantly more useful and up-to-date.
Use Cases
- Scrape TikTok video data for influencer analysis
- Extract Google Maps business listings for lead generation
- Crawl website content in Markdown to feed into LLM or RAG pipelines
- Monitor e-commerce product prices across multiple retailers
- Collect real-time social media posts from Facebook pages for brand tracking
- Automate data extraction from LinkedIn job postings for market research
- Use MCP server to let AI agents pull live web data on demand
Limitations
- Apify is a cloud-based platform for web scraping and automation; on-premise deployment is not mentioned in the evidence.
- The platform requires some technical skill to configure Actors and use the API, though the Academies offer courses from beginner to expert.
- Pricing is usage-based (pay-as-you-go compute units), and the free tier includes only a small amount of credit.
- While anti-blocking proxies are provided, success is not guaranteed on all websites.
as of 2026-08-16
Verification history
We have re-verified Apify 4 times since . Each pass re-reads the vendor's own pages and re-checks every listed field against that evidence; passes where nothing had changed are marked as such.
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
Free to cite with attribution — this page re-verifies continuously.
12-month cost
Project the real annual outlay, including the implied monthly cost when only an annual tier is published.
Vendor list price only. Add-on usage, seat overages, and contract minimums are surfaced under Hidden costs & gotchas.
Plans compared
For each published Apify tier: who it actually fits, and what it adds vs. the previous tier. Cross-reference the cost calculator above for projected annual outlay.
Free
$0/mo
Ideal for
Solo developers or curious users who want to test Apify's Actors with $5 of free credit—enough for a few small scraping jobs.
What this tier adds
Starting tier with $5 prepaid usage and community support. No discounts, limited concurrent runs (25) and RAM (16GB).
Starter
$29/mo + pay as you go
Ideal for
Freelancers and small teams that need regular scraping with a bit more quota and chat support.
What this tier adds
Adds $29 prepaid usage, 64GB RAM, 32 concurrent runs, 30 datacenter IPs, and bronze support/discounts.
Scale
$199/mo + pay as you go
Ideal for
Growing businesses that scrape at higher volume and need priority support and more proxies.
What this tier adds
Increases prepaid usage to $199, lowers compute cost to $0.16/CU, adds 200 datacenter IPs, residential proxies, and silver support.
Business
$999/mo + pay as you go
Ideal for
Large teams with heavy scraping needs, requiring high concurrency and an account manager.
What this tier adds
Offers $999 prepaid usage, lowest compute rate ($0.13/CU), 500 datacenter IPs, residential proxies at $7/GB, and gold support.
Enterprise
Custom
Ideal for
Organizations with custom requirements: SLAs, SSO, dedicated support, and tailored quotas.
What this tier adds
Custom pricing, dedicated expert team, custom compute rates, storage/proxy options, and advanced security features.
Where the pricing makes sense
The company stage and team size where Apify's pricing actually pencils out — and where peers do it cheaper.
Apify's pricing suits developers and teams that need flexibility and scale, with plans from $0 to $999/month. Compared to simpler tools like ScraperAPI (starting at $29/mo) or Zyte (from $39/mo), Apify's free tier and per-run pricing can be more cost-effective for small projects, but for heavy use, dedicated plans may be pricier than alternatives.
Setup time & first value
How long it actually takes to get something useful out of Apify — broken out by persona, not the marketing-page minute.
If you're using a pre-built Actor, you can get your first run in as little as 5 minutes—just pick an Actor, configure your input, and run. Building custom Actors with Crawlee might take an afternoon to set up your first project, depending on your experience. Integrating the API or MCP server can take a few hours.
Switching to or from Apify
How to bring data in from common predecessors and how to get it back out — written for the switcher, not the buyer.
- →From self-hosted Scrapy: You can deploy your Scrapy spiders as Actors using Apify's Scrapy integration, reusing your existing code with minimal changes.
- →From Octoparse: Use Apify's pre-built Actors to replicate your scraping tasks, and use the API to export data similarly.
- →From browser extensions like Web Scraper: Manually recreate your selectors in a custom Actor or use Crawlee to port your scraping logic.
- ↗To self-hosted Crawlee: Apify's open-source library, you can move your Actors to your own infrastructure and run them there.
- ↗To Scrapy Cloud: You can export your Actor code and adapt it to Scrapy Cloud's environment, though you'll lose Apify's storage and proxy management.
- ↗To a custom solution: Since you own your Actor code, you can extract it and host it on your own servers or cloud functions.
Integrations
Resources & Guides
Tutorials & Learning
Official links
Tools that pair well with Apify
Common stack mates teams adopt alongside Apify, with the specific reason each pairing earns its keep.
Featured Head-to-Head Comparisons
Apify vs Screenplayiq
If you're a screenwriter or producer needing data-driven feedback on a feature film's marketability, ScreenplayIQ is the clear choice. For anyone building AI agents or collecting web data at scale, Apify's vast marketplace and automation capabilities are unmatched. These tools serve completely different purposes – choose based on your core need.
Apify vs Truleo
Truleo and Apify serve entirely different domains. Truleo is purpose-built for law enforcement to extract leads from siloed internal data, while Apify is a general-purpose web scraping platform for developers. Choose Truleo if you're in a police department needing automated intelligence; choose Apify if you need to collect public web data at scale. They are not alternatives.
Apify vs Presto Voice
Choose Presto Voice if you're a QSR chain aiming to automate drive-thru ordering and lift revenue; its proven upselling engine and high automation rate are unmatched for that niche. Choose Apify if you need to scrape web data at scale for AI or analytics—its marketplace of 46k+ Actors and serverless platform make it the go-to for developers, not restaurant operators. These tools are fundamentally different; your choice depends entirely on whether your problem is in the drive-thru or on the web.
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