# Substack Newsletter, Author & Post Scraper (`kravennagen/substack-scraper`) Actor

Extract newsletters, articles, likes, comments, author bios, and metrics from any Substack publication via direct API.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/kravennagen/substack-scraper.md
- **Developed by:** [Morgane Flamant](https://apify.com/kravennagen) (community)
- **Categories:** Automation, News, Developer tools
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

from $0.40 / 1,000 extracted substack posts

This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events.
Since this Actor supports Apify Store discounts, the price gets lower the higher subscription plan you have.

Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/actors/running/actors-in-store.md#pay-per-event

## What's an Apify Actor?

Actors are web data automations that power AI and operations. They run on the Apify platform to scrape websites, process data, connect APIs, and automate workflows.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.
Actors are written with capital "A".

## How to integrate an Actor?

If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.
The best way to integrate Actors is as follows.

- **AI agents and MCP clients** — the [Apify MCP server](https://docs.apify.com/integrations/mcp.md) at `https://mcp.apify.com` (remote, streamable HTTP, OAuth on first use).
- **Agentic workflows and local Actor development** — [Agent Skills](https://apify.com/.well-known/agent-skills/index.json) with the [Apify CLI](https://docs.apify.com/cli/docs.md): `npm install -g apify-cli`, then `apify login`.
- **JavaScript/TypeScript projects** — the official [JS/TS client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md): `npm install apify-client`.
- **Python projects** — the official [Python client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md): `pip install apify-client`.
- **Any other language** — the [REST API](https://docs.apify.com/api/v2.md).

For usage examples, see the [API](#api) section below.

For more details, see Apify documentation as [Markdown index](https://docs.apify.com/llms.txt) and [Markdown full-text](https://docs.apify.com/llms-full.txt).

# README

## 📰 Substack Newsletter & Post Scraper

Extract posts, author bios, likes, comments, and engagement metrics from any Substack publication — fast, via direct JSON API with zero headless browser overhead.

***

### ✨ Features

- **⚡ Direct API Access**: Hits Substack's internal `/api/v1/archive` and `/api/v1/publication` endpoints directly.
- **🚀 Zero Browser Overhead**: Pure async HTTP via `httpx`; runs efficiently in ~128 MB RAM.
- **🌐 Multi-Publication Batching**: Scrape as many Substack slugs or URLs as needed in a single run.
- **📄 Automatic Pagination**: Pages through full publication archives automatically.
- **📊 Standardized Pydantic Output**: Clean, validated output dataset ready for downstream AI pipelines, analytics, or CSV/JSON exports.

***

### 📥 Input Parameters

The Actor accepts the following input options in JSON format:

| Field | Type | Default | Description |
| :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- |
| `subdomains` | `array` | `["lennysnewsletter", "thealgorithmicbridge"]` | List of Substack subdomains/slugs or full URLs to scrape. |
| `maxPostsPerSubdomain` | `integer` | `50` | Maximum posts to scrape per publication (set `0` for unlimited). |

#### Example Input JSON

```json
{
  "subdomains": [
    "lennysnewsletter",
    "thealgorithmicbridge",
    "https://pragmaticengineer.substack.com/"
  ],
  "maxPostsPerSubdomain": 100
}
```

***

### 📤 Output Format

Each dataset record represents an individual Substack post:

```json
{
  "id": 123456789,
  "publication_name": "Lenny's Newsletter",
  "publication_subdomain": "lennysnewsletter",
  "publication_url": "https://lennysnewsletter.substack.com/",
  "title": "How to build a product people love",
  "subtitle": "Lessons from 50 top product leaders",
  "slug": "how-to-build-a-product-people-love",
  "post_url": "https://lennysnewsletter.substack.com/p/how-to-build-a-product-people-love",
  "published_at": "2024-03-15T09:00:00.000Z",
  "canonical_url": "https://lennysnewsletter.substack.com/p/how-to-build-a-product-people-love",
  "audience": "everyone",
  "cover_image_url": "https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/...",
  "likes_count": 1842,
  "comments_count": 94,
  "word_count": 2300,
  "reading_time_minutes": 10,
  "authors": ["Lenny Rachitsky"],
  "body_excerpt": "After interviewing 50 of the world's best product leaders..."
}
```

***

### 🚀 Running Locally

#### Step 1: Install Dependencies

```bash
pip install -r requirements.txt
```

#### Step 2: Run the Actor

```bash
python -m src.main
```

***

### 🐳 Docker Support

To build and run containerized:

```bash
docker build -t substack-scraper .
docker run -it substack-scraper
```

# Actor input Schema

## `subdomains` (type: `array`):

List of Substack publication slugs or full URLs (e.g., 'lennysnewsletter', 'https://pragmaticengineer.com/').

## `maxPostsPerSubdomain` (type: `integer`):

Maximum number of articles to extract per publication. Set to 0 for unlimited.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "subdomains": [
    "lennysnewsletter",
    "thealgorithmicbridge"
  ],
  "maxPostsPerSubdomain": 50
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `results` (type: `string`):

Clean structured Substack articles

# API

You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.

## JavaScript example

```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
    token: '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>',
});

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {
    "subdomains": [
        "lennysnewsletter",
        "thealgorithmicbridge"
    ],
    "maxPostsPerSubdomain": 50
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("kravennagen/substack-scraper").call(input);

// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.dir(item);
});

// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs

```

## Python example

```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient

# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_API_TOKEN>")

# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = {
    "subdomains": [
        "lennysnewsletter",
        "thealgorithmicbridge",
    ],
    "maxPostsPerSubdomain": 50,
}

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("kravennagen/substack-scraper").call(run_input=run_input)

# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print(f"💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}")
for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items():
    print(item)

# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start

```

## CLI example

```bash
echo '{
  "subdomains": [
    "lennysnewsletter",
    "thealgorithmicbridge"
  ],
  "maxPostsPerSubdomain": 50
}' |
apify call kravennagen/substack-scraper --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,kravennagen/substack-scraper"
        }
    }
}

```

The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer <APIFY_API_TOKEN>` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations).

## OpenAPI specification

Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/DSQ3UCN5DBKVGeMcQ/builds/VCCAoeDJnNDfJDFH5/openapi.json