Colombia NIT Lookup - RUES Company Registry Search

What is Colombia NIT Lookup - RUES Company Registry Search?

This Actor looks up Colombian companies by NIT and searches the RUES (Registro Único Empresarial y Social), Colombia's official business registry run by the chambers of commerce (Confecámaras), using the government's open data API on datos.gov.co. Use it for consulta NIT, consulta RUES and búsqueda de empresas: get the official name (razón social), registration status, legal form, chamber of commerce, CIIU activity, registration and renewal dates and legal representative, plus optional establishments, branches and agencies. Export as JSON, CSV or Excel or pull the data through the Apify API.

• ✅ Official source: 9M+ registrations from the RUES open data published by Confecámaras (companies, sole traders and non-profits/ESAL).
• ✅ No API key, no captcha, no proxy: uses the public datos.gov.co (Socrata) API instead of scraping rues.org.co.
• ✅ Bulk NIT lookup: paste hundreds of NITs in any format (860.002.964-4, 8600029644); check digit (dígito de verificación) computed and validated.
• ✅ Lead lists: new companies by chamber of commerce, CIIU code, legal form (SAS, Ltda., S.A.), status and registration date.
• ✅ Cheap and predictable: $1.50 per 1,000 results, platform usage included.

What Colombian company data can you get?

Field	Meaning
nit, verificationDigit, nitFormatted	NIT, DIAN check digit (DV) and NIT-DV
idType, idNumber	Identification type (NIT, cédula…) and number
name, acronym	Registered name (razón social) and acronym (sigla)
status, statusCode, isActive	Registration status (ACTIVA, CANCELADA…)
legalForm, companyType, isLegalEntity	Legal form (SAS, Ltda., S.A., persona natural, ESAL…)
chamber, chamberCode, registrationNumber	Chamber of commerce and matrícula mercantil number
registrationDate, renewalDate, lastRenewedYear	Registration date, last renewal date and year
expiryDate, cancellationDate	Term (vigencia) and cancellation date
ciiuPrimary, ciiuSecondary, ciiuOther	CIIU Rev. 4 A.C. activity codes
ciiuSection, ciiuDivision, ciiuDivisionName	ISIC section/division with English description
legalRepresentative	Legal representative name (representante legal)
bidderRegistration	RUP bidder registration number, if any
establishments, establishmentCount	Optional: establishments, branches and agencies owned by the company
source, sourceUrl, license, attribution, retrievedAt	Source link and licence notice

Each record is one registration (matrícula). A company that moved its domicile can have an old cancelled registration in one chamber and an active one in another, so a NIT can return more than one record (active first).

Use cases for Colombian company lookup

• 🔎 KYB and supplier onboarding in Colombia: verify that a NIT exists, is ACTIVA and renewed, and who the legal representative is.
• 📈 B2B lead generation: lists of newly registered companies (empresas nuevas) by city, sector (CIIU) and legal form, e.g. new software SAS in Bogotá this month.
• 🗂️ CRM and ERP data cleaning: normalize NITs, compute check digits and enrich accounts with official names and activity codes.
• 🏦 Credit and risk teams: spot cancelled, unrenewed or newly created counterparties.
• 🗺️ Market research: count companies per chamber of commerce, sector or legal form.

How to look up Colombian companies

1. Click Try for free (or Start) on this page.
2. Paste NITs one per line (dots, spaces and -DV are fine), and/or type words for the Company name search.
3. For lead lists, pick Chamber of commerce (e.g. 04 Bogotá, 21 Medellín, 08 Cali), Registration status, Legal form, CIIU activity codes and Registered in the last N days.
4. Optionally enable Include establishments & branches.
5. Set Max results (your cost cap), click Start, then open the Output tab or export as JSON, CSV, Excel, XML or HTML.

With empty input the Actor looks up three demo companies (Banco de Bogotá, Bancolombia and Ecopetrol).

Input example: bulk NIT lookup

{
  "nits": ["860002964", "890903938-8", "899.999.068-1"]
}

Input example: new software companies in Bogotá (last 30 days)

{
  "chambers": ["04"],
  "legalForms": ["sas"],
  "ciiuCodes": ["62"],
  "status": "active",
  "registeredWithinDays": 30,
  "maxItems": 500
}

Field	Description
nits	NITs or ID numbers to look up, one per line.
name	Words that must all appear in the razón social (case-insensitive).
chambers	Chamber of commerce codes (04 Bogotá, 21 Medellín, 08 Cali, 03 Barranquilla …).
status	any, active or cancelled (search only).
entityType	any, legal (companies & non-profits) or natural (sole traders).
legalForms	sas, ltda, sa, unipersonal, scs, sca, colectiva, extranjera, cooperativa, eat, otras, persona_natural.
ciiuCodes	CIIU codes: 4 digits = exact, 1–3 digits = prefix (e.g. 62, 47).
matchSecondaryCiiu	Also match secondary activities.
registeredWithinDays, registeredFrom, registeredTo	Registration date filters.
renewedSince	Last renewal year ≥ this year (e.g. 2025).
sortBy	newest (default), oldest, name.
maxItems	Max records per run (default 100, up to 50,000).
includeEstablishments, maxEstablishments	Nested establishments, branches and agencies per company.
appToken	Optional Socrata app token for very large jobs.

Output example

{
  "ok": true,
  "nit": "860002964",
  "verificationDigit": "4",
  "nitFormatted": "860002964-4",
  "idType": "NIT",
  "idNumber": "860002964",
  "name": "BANCO DE BOGOTA",
  "isLegalEntity": true,
  "legalForm": "SOCIEDAD ANONIMA",
  "companyType": "SOCIEDAD COMERCIAL",
  "status": "ACTIVA",
  "isActive": true,
  "chamberCode": "04",
  "chamber": "BOGOTA",
  "registrationNumber": "221830",
  "registrationDate": "1984-10-12",
  "renewalDate": "2026-03-19",
  "lastRenewedYear": 2026,
  "expiryDate": "2070-06-30",
  "ciiuPrimary": "6412",
  "ciiuSection": "K",
  "ciiuDivision": "64",
  "ciiuDivisionName": "Financial service activities, except insurance and pension funding",
  "legalRepresentative": "CESAR PRADO VILLEGAS",
  "recordUpdatedAt": "2026-08-31T17:20:39",
  "method": "nit",
  "queried": "860002964",
  "source": "rues_confecamaras_datos_gov_co",
  "sourceUrl": "https://www.datos.gov.co/d/c82u-588k",
  "license": "CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)",
  "attribution": "Fuente: Registro Único Empresarial y Social (RUES) - Confecámaras, datos abiertos publicados en datos.gov.co (dataset c82u-588k). Datos normalizados por este actor.",
  "retrievedAt": "2026-10-07T07:40:00+00:00"
}

NITs that are invalid or not in the registry produce an item with "ok": false and an error (not_found, invalid_nit) so you can reconcile every input. inputCheckDigitValid tells you whether the check digit you typed was correct.

How much does Colombian company data cost?

This Actor uses pay-per-result pricing: $1.50 per 1,000 results ($0.0015 per record), with Apify platform usage already included. Apify also charges a tiny Actor start fee of $0.00005 per run per GB of memory.

• What counts as a result? Every item written to the dataset: one per registration found, plus one per invalid / not-found NIT (ok: false rows).
• Establishments are free of extra result charges: they are nested inside the company record (they only make the run slower).
• Temporary failures are not charged. If datos.gov.co is unreachable or returns an error (after retries), the run fails with a clear message instead of writing error rows, so you are never charged for a source outage (records already found are kept).
• Control your spend with maxItems (default 100).
• How much fits in one run? At the defaults a run outputs at most 100 records. Raise maxItems (up to 50,000) for bigger jobs. NITs are queried in batches of 40 per API call, so even 50,000 NITs fit in the default 30-minute timeout. With establishments turned on, each company needs one or two extra calls, so plan for roughly 1,500 companies per run; for more, raise the run timeout or split the list into several runs.
• Examples: 1,000 NITs (with maxItems: 1000) ≈ $1.50. The default input (3 companies) ≈ $0.008.
• Free plan: Apify's free plan includes $5 of monthly usage, which covers about 3,000 records.

Use the Colombia NIT API from Python, JavaScript or no-code tools

Python (apify-client):

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>")
run = client.actor("1rrock/colombia-nit-lookup").call(
    run_input={"nits": ["860002964", "890903938-8", "899999068"]}
)
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item.get("nitFormatted"), item.get("name"), item.get("status"), item.get("legalRepresentative"))

JavaScript / Node.js (apify-client):

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: '<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>' });
const run = await client.actor('1rrock/colombia-nit-lookup').call({
    chambers: ['21'], ciiuCodes: ['4711'], status: 'active', registeredWithinDays: 60, maxItems: 200,
});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items.map((i) => [i.nitFormatted, i.name, i.registrationDate]));

HTTP (one call, returns the results):

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/1rrock~colombia-nit-lookup/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"nits": ["860002964"]}'

No-code: connect the Actor to Zapier, Make, Google Sheets (with Google Sheets Import & Export), webhooks and other integrations. Run it on a schedule for a weekly new-companies feed, or let AI agents call it through the Apify MCP server.

FAQ

Is it legal to use RUES data commercially?

Yes. Confecámaras publishes this RUES extract on datos.gov.co under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA 4.0), which allows commercial use with attribution; if you redistribute the data (or a modified version) you must credit the source and share it under the same licence. Every record carries the attribution and license fields. Merchant registry data is public information under Colombian law; use personal data of sole traders and legal representatives responsibly and in line with Ley 1581 de 2012.

Is this the same as the RUES website or a certificado de existencia?

No. The data comes from the official RUES open data extract, not from the rues.org.co search page, and it is not a legal certificate (certificado de existencia y representación legal). For legal proceedings, obtain a certificate from the chamber of commerce.

How fresh is the data?

Confecámaras refreshes the open dataset regularly (roughly weekly; last refresh shown in recordUpdatedAt per record and on the dataset page). Very recent registrations may lack a NIT until DIAN assigns it, so nit can be null for brand-new companies.

Why does a NIT return more than one record?

Each record is one matrícula. Companies that changed domicile, or that were registered in more than one chamber, appear once per chamber. Active registrations are returned first; use isActive or status to pick the current one.

What does the data not include?

Addresses, phone numbers, emails, financial statements and shareholders are not part of the RUES open data extract.

Fair use

The Actor queries the public datos.gov.co API politely (sequential requests with a short delay and exponential backoff on HTTP 429 / 5xx). For very large or frequent jobs you can add your own free Socrata app token.

Data source and license

• Source: Registro Único Empresarial y Social (RUES), Confecámaras, published on datos.gov.co: Personas Naturales, Personas Jurídicas y ESAL (c82u-588k) and Establecimientos - Agencias - Sucursales (nb3d-v3n7).
• Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0. Attribution: "Fuente: RUES - Confecámaras, datos.gov.co". Field names were translated/normalized and ISIC division descriptions added by this Actor; the output is shared under the same licence.
• This Actor is not affiliated with or endorsed by Confecámaras, the chambers of commerce, DIAN or MinTIC.

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