The Zebra Scraper — Car Insurance Quotes, Rates & Market Data

Extract car insurance quotes, auto/home insurance rates, carrier comparisons, premium estimates, insurance industry statistics, and carrier partner lists from The Zebra (thezebra.com) — one of the largest U.S. auto and home insurance comparison marketplaces. Build datasets for car insurance price monitoring, auto insurance rate comparison, and insurance market research without relying on the official API.

Main Use Cases

• Car insurance price monitoring — track premium and rate changes over time on The Zebra's comparison and guide pages
• Auto insurance rate comparison — pull carrier-by-carrier rate data and premium estimates for cost analysis
• Insurance market research — collect insurance industry statistics, carrier lists, and pricing data points in one dataset
• Insurance competitor analysis — see how insurers (Progressive, GEICO, Allstate, Travelers, and 100+ more) position rates and coverage
• Building an insurance carrier database — capture carrier names, logos, and partner listings for downstream analysis
• Home & renters insurance data — extract rate and coverage content from The Zebra's home, renters, and life insurance pages

How It Works

This actor makes one short Playwright browser visit to The Zebra to clear Cloudflare's challenge and obtain a cf_clearance cookie, then switches to fast Cheerio-based HTTP scraping over Apify residential proxies. It crawls the pages you target, extracts structured page data (headings, paragraphs, statistics, carriers, rate amounts, links), and saves each page as a clean JSON record in the default dataset. You can add or override fields with JavaScript via extendOutputFunction and customMapFunction.

Extract Car Insurance Rate Data Without Official API Access

The Zebra does not offer a public API (no developer portal, OpenAPI spec, or SDK — integrations are enterprise-negotiated only). This actor is the practical way to collect The Zebra's published insurance comparison content and rate statistics as structured data, on your own schedule.

Build Business Databases From Insurance Comparison Pages

Instead of manually copy-pasting from dozens of The Zebra guide and comparison pages, run this actor once or on a recurring schedule to assemble a clean, queryable dataset of insurance pages, carrier lists, and rate data points.

Input

The Zebra Scraper is configured through an input JSON with the following fields:

Field	Type	Required	Default	Notes
startUrls	array of { url }	No	The Zebra homepage + auto/homeowners/renters/average-cost pages	URLs to start scraping from; crawler stays on thezebra.com within auto/home/renters/life/health paths
maxResults	integer	No	100	Maximum number of pages (dataset items) to scrape; the actor stops after reaching this limit
proxyConfiguration	object	No	Apify residential proxies	Proxy settings for bot-detection bypass
extendOutputFunction	string	No	""	JavaScript expression receiving ($, item); returns extra/override fields
customMapFunction	string	No	""	JavaScript function receiving item; returns the mapped item

Output

Each dataset item is one scraped The Zebra page:

Field	Type	Description
url	string	URL of the scraped page
title	string	Page title or first H1 heading
headings	array	H1, H2, H3 headings extracted from the page
paragraphs	array	Paragraph text content from the page
lists	array	List item text extracted from the page
links	array of { text, href }	Hyperlinks found on the page
images	array of { src, alt }	Images found on the page
statistics	array	Insurance statistics and data points (dollar/percent figures about rates, cost, premiums, savings)
carriers	array of { name, logo }	Insurance carriers and partners detected on the page
rateInfo	array	Dollar amounts and pricing data found on the page
structuredData	array	JSON-LD structured data embedded in the page

Example Input

{
  "startUrls": [
    { "url": "https://www.thezebra.com/auto-insurance/" },
    { "url": "https://www.thezebra.com/homeowners-insurance/" }
  ],
  "maxResults": 50,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true,
    "apifyProxyGroups": ["RESIDENTIAL"]
  }
}

Example Output

{
  "url": "https://www.thezebra.com/auto-insurance/",
  "title": "Compare Auto Insurance Rates",
  "headings": ["Compare Auto Insurance Quotes", "Top Car Insurance Companies"],
  "paragraphs": ["The Zebra compares real quotes side by side from top companies."],
  "lists": ["Progressive", "GEICO", "Allstate"],
  "statistics": ["The average cost of car insurance is $1,834 per year."],
  "carriers": [
    { "name": "Progressive Insurance", "logo": "https://www.thezebra.com/img/progressive.png" }
  ],
  "rateInfo": ["$125/month", "$1,500/year"],
  "structuredData": [{ "@type": "Organization", "name": "The Zebra" }]
}

Integrations & Automation

• Apify API — call the actor programmatically from your own app or script.
• Webhooks — get notified when a run finishes and push new items to your system.
• Zapier / Make — connect scraped insurance data to spreadsheets, databases, or BI dashboards.

Recommended schedule: run weekly for car insurance price monitoring and rate tracking, and monthly to refresh insurance market research and carrier databases.

Related Actors

• Coverfox Scraper — Indian Insurance Comparison Plans
• MoneySuperMarket Scraper — UK Financial Comparison
• Bankrate Financial Rates Scraper
• Comparis Scraper — Swiss Insurance & Telecom Comparison

FAQ

Why use this actor instead of the official API?

The Zebra does not provide a public API. There is no developer portal, no OpenAPI reference, and no SDK — integrations are only done through enterprise partnership deals. This actor is the practical way to extract The Zebra's published insurance comparison content and rate data as structured JSON.

What are alternatives to The Zebra for car insurance rate data?

The Zebra is one of several major U.S. auto/home insurance comparison marketplaces. Comparable sites include Insurify, Compare.com, NerdWallet, Policygenius, EverQuote, and Jerry. This actor focuses specifically on The Zebra's content; other comparison sites can be covered by their own scrapers.

What car insurance data does The Zebra publish?

The Zebra publishes average car insurance rates by state and city, carrier-by-carrier premium comparisons, premium estimates, coverage guidance, and insurance industry statistics. Its rate estimates are sourced from rate filings via Quadrant Information Services and from anonymized real customer quote data.

How much does the average cost of car insurance vary by state?

Average car insurance costs differ sharply by state — for example Florida, Louisiana, and Missouri are among the most expensive, while Vermont, New Hampshire, and Idaho are the least expensive. This actor can capture The Zebra's state rate content for your own analysis.

How can I build an insurance carrier or price database?

Use startUrls to target The Zebra's auto, home, renters, life, and health comparison pages, set a sensible maxResults, and run on a weekly or monthly schedule. The carriers, statistics, and rateInfo fields give you per-carrier names, logos, and pricing data points.

Can I extend or transform the output?

Yes. extendOutputFunction lets you add or override fields with JavaScript against the scraped item and the Cheerio $ object, and customMapFunction lets you reshape each output item to your own schema.

SEO Keywords

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For AI Agents & LLM Apps

This actor is callable via the Apify MCP server and the Apify API. Returns one JSON record per scraped The Zebra page, containing page content, carrier lists, and rate statistics.

Minimal working input (smallest valid run):

{
  "startUrls": [{ "url": "https://www.thezebra.com/auto-insurance/" }],
  "maxResults": 10
}

To scrape a broader comparison scope, add multiple library pages:

{
  "startUrls": [
    { "url": "https://www.thezebra.com/auto-insurance/" },
    { "url": "https://www.thezebra.com/homeowners-insurance/" }
  ],
  "maxResults": 50
}

Output fields: url, title, headings, paragraphs, lists, links, images, statistics, carriers, rateInfo, structuredData.

Behaviors an agent should know:

• maxResults is the cost-relevant cap — it limits how many pages are scraped (defaults to 100 when unset). Set it to bound cost; the actor is billed per result ($0.0025/item) plus a run start cost.
• startUrls overrides the built-in default page list (homepage + auto/homeowners/renters/average-cost pages). If you omit it, the defaults are used.
• The crawler only stays on thezebra.com within auto/home/renters/life/health paths — supply specific /states/ or guide URLs via startUrls to target them.
• extendOutputFunction receives the Cheerio $ object and the current item; customMapFunction transforms each output item. Both are optional.

Legal & Compliance Disclaimer

This actor is an independent tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by The Zebra (thezebra.com). It only accesses publicly available pages on the site — it does not bypass logins and does not solve CAPTCHAs. Users are responsible for complying with The Zebra's Terms of Service and applicable laws. Do not use extracted personal contact data for unsolicited commercial outreach. This information is provided for transparency and is not legal advice.