🏢 Yellow Pages US Scraper

Scrape Yellow Pages US business listings into clean, structured data — business name, phone, full address, website, star rating, review count, review snippets, photos and categories — from a simple search term + location or from bulk search URLs.

⚡ Streams results into the dataset as each listing is parsed — no waiting until the run ends for partial output. Refresh the run page and watch rows appear live.

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✨ Why choose this scraper?

• 🧠 Smart proxy auto-escalation — starts direct (no proxy, cheapest and fastest), then automatically falls back to a datacenter proxy, then a US residential proxy if Yellow Pages pushes back. Once on residential it stays there. You never have to think about it.
• 🔎 Search OR bulk URLs — type Dentist + New York and hit Start, or paste a list of Yellow Pages search URLs. Both work; mix them freely.
• 📍 Location auto-correct — loose input like austin tx is resolved to the Yellow Pages canonical form (Austin, TX) via their own autosuggest service.
• 🧱 Browser TLS impersonation — every request carries a genuine Chrome/Edge fingerprint (via curl_cffi), so Yellow Pages serves real HTML instead of a bot page — without the cost of a headless browser.
• 📄 Automatic pagination — follows the "Next" link to the last page of every search.
• 📊 Sectioned dataset tabs — Overview, Contact, Reviews and Media views built in.
• 💳 Pay per event — you pay only for listings actually delivered.

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🔑 Key Features

	Field extracted
📢	Paid-ad flag (isAd) — sponsored vs organic result
🏢	Business name
📍	Street address
📞	Phone number
🌐	Business website
⭐	Star rating (1–5)
🗳️	Review count
💬	Customer review snippet
ℹ️	"From Business" description snippet
🖼️	Business photo (full-size URL)
🏷️	Category list
🔗	Yellow Pages profile URL

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📥 Input

Field	Type	Required	Default	Description
search	string	❌*	Dentist	Business type, category or company name
location	string	❌*	New York	US city, City, ST, or ZIP code
startUrls	array	❌*	–	Bulk Yellow Pages search-result URLs
maxItems	integer	❌	50	Cap on total listings (0 = unlimited)
debugMode	boolean	❌	false	Verbose debug logging in the run log (troubleshooting)
requestDelay	number	❌	1.0	Base seconds between requests (jitter added)
proxyConfiguration	object	❌	direct	Proxy override — defaults to no proxy

* Provide either search + location or startUrls (or both).

Example input

{
  "search": "Dentist",
  "location": "New York, NY",
  "maxItems": 50,
  "requestDelay": 1.0,
  "proxyConfiguration": { "useApifyProxy": false }
}

Bulk URL example

{
  "startUrls": [
    "https://www.yellowpages.com/search?search_terms=plumber&geo_location_terms=New+York%2C+NY",
    "https://www.yellowpages.com/search?search_terms=coffee&geo_location_terms=Austin%2C+TX"
  ],
  "maxItems": 200
}

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📤 Output

Each dataset row is one business listing. Empty fields are omitted, exactly like the reference output.

{
  "isAd": false,
  "url": "https://www.yellowpages.com/new-york-ny/mip/dr-kara-mason-dmd-5721648",
  "name": "Dr. Kara Mason, DMD",
  "address": "30 E 60th St Rm 503, New York, NY 10022",
  "phone": "(212) 355-2195",
  "website": "http://www.gentledentalnyc.com",
  "rating": 5,
  "ratingCount": 175,
  "reviewSnippet": "Extremely knowledgeable of craft with sincere care for her patients.\"",
  "image": "https://i4.ypcdn.com/blob/80cd8b97ee48d0b7715eacdc0801d77c44cc978b",
  "categories": ["Dentists", "Oral & Maxillofacial Surgery"]
}

Field	Type	Description
isAd	boolean	true for paid/sponsored listings, false for organic
url	string	Yellow Pages business profile URL
name	string	Business name
address	string	Street address
phone	string	Phone number
website	string	Business website (when listed)
rating	number	Star rating, 1–5 (when rated)
ratingCount	integer	Number of reviews (when rated)
reviewSnippet	string	A sample customer review (when present)
infoSnippet	string	"From Business" description (when present)
image	string	Business photo URL (when present)
categories	array	Yellow Pages category labels

The dataset has four ready-made views — 📋 Overview, 📞 Contact, ⭐ Ratings & Reviews and 🖼️ Media — so you can focus on one section at a time.

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🚀 How to Use (Apify Console)

1. Log in at console.apify.com → Actors.
2. Open Yellow Pages US Scraper.
3. Enter a 🔎 Search term and 📍 Location — or paste 🌐 URLs.
4. Set 🔢 Maximum listings (default 50).
5. Click Start.
6. Watch listings stream into the run log and dataset in real time.
7. When the run finishes, open the Output tab.
8. Export to JSON / CSV / Excel or pull via API.

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🤖 Use via API

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/YOUR~yellow-pages-us-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
     -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
     -d '{
       "search": "Plumber",
       "location": "Austin, TX",
       "maxItems": 50
     }'

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🛡️ How blocking is handled

Yellow Pages occasionally rate-limits aggressive traffic. This actor handles it automatically:

1. Direct — requests go straight to Yellow Pages (no proxy cost).
2. On a block → datacenter proxy.
3. On another block → US residential proxy (sticky from here on).
4. Residential is retried up to 3 times with a fresh IP and a cooldown.

Every escalation is logged clearly in the run log, e.g. 🔄 Yellow Pages blocked the request on DIRECT — switching to DATACENTER proxy.

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💡 Best Use Cases

• 📇 Lead generation — build B2B contact lists by category and city.
• 📊 Local market research — map competitors in any US metro.
• 🗺️ Local SEO audits — track ratings, reviews and categories.
• 🤝 Sales prospecting — phone/website lists for outreach.

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💳 Pricing

This actor uses the pay-per-event model. You are charged once per business listing successfully delivered to the dataset (listing-scraped). Runs that return no data cost nothing beyond the standard run start. The actor stops cleanly when a configured spend limit is reached.

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❓ FAQ

Do I need a proxy? No. The actor runs direct by default and only turns proxies on if Yellow Pages blocks it — and it does that for you.

Can I scrape multiple cities at once? Yes — use Bulk URL mode and paste one search URL per city.

Why are some fields missing on a row? Yellow Pages does not list a phone, website, rating or photo for every business. Empty fields are omitted rather than returned as null.

How many results per search? Yellow Pages caps each search at roughly 30 pages. Use a more specific location to surface different businesses.

Does it scrape individual business detail pages? No — it collects everything from the search-result cards, which is fast and covers all the fields above.

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📨 Support & Feedback

Found a bug or need an extra field? Contact dev.scraperengine@gmail.com or open an issue on the actor's Apify page.

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⚖️ Legal

This scraper collects only publicly available data from Yellow Pages. You are responsible for using the data in compliance with applicable laws (GDPR, CCPA, anti-spam regulations) and the Yellow Pages Terms of Service.