Alien Ads Library Scraper

Collect public Reddit ad creatives from Alien Ads Library as structured, export-ready data.

Use the actor to research advertisers, archive creative concepts, inspect landing-page destinations, and monitor when Reddit ads first or last appeared. No Alien Ads Library account or Reddit login is required.

What does Alien Ads Library Scraper do?

Alien Ads Library Scraper reads the public ad catalog and saves one dataset row per Reddit ad.

It extracts:

• ad headline and body copy
• advertiser username
• destination URL and domain
• original and archived media URLs
• Reddit post ID and direct Reddit link
• category and subreddit, when available
• first-seen, last-seen, and Reddit creation dates
• active status and creative performance score, when available
• direct source link back to Alien Ads Library

The actor follows the catalog cursor automatically, so a single run can collect more than the first page.

Why use this Reddit ads scraper?

Manual ad-library research is useful but difficult to repeat at scale.

This actor turns the catalog into JSON, CSV, Excel, XML, or RSS exports that can feed analysis and monitoring workflows.

Typical benefits include:

• compare competitors without copying cards by hand
• build a searchable creative swipe file
• discover domains buying Reddit traffic
• track changes with scheduled runs
• send new records into Sheets, databases, or BI tools
• summarize creative themes with an LLM

Who is it for?

Paid social teams

Review how brands position products in Reddit-native ad copy.

Creative strategists

Collect headlines and media references for concept analysis and briefing.

Competitive intelligence teams

Monitor advertiser activity, destinations, and creative longevity.

Agencies

Create repeatable research exports for client categories and pitches.

Growth and product marketing teams

Study offers, calls to action, and landing-page patterns used by active advertisers.

Data teams

Load normalized ad records into a warehouse or internal dashboard.

What data can you extract?

Field	Type	Description
id	number	Alien Ads Library record ID
redditId	string	Reddit thing ID
redditUrl	string	Direct Reddit comments URL
headline	string/null	Ad headline or primary creative copy
bodyText	string/null	Additional body text
adType	string	Ad type reported by the source
advertiserUsername	string/null	Reddit advertiser username
advertiserUrl	string/null	Alien Ads Library advertiser URL
destinationUrl	string/null	Normalized landing-page URL
destinationDomain	string/null	Landing-page hostname
mediaUrl	string/null	Original media URL
archivedMediaUrl	string/null	Archived creative media URL
subreddit	string/null	Target or associated subreddit when available
category	string/null	Catalog category when available
creativePerformanceScore	number/null	Source performance score when available
redditCreatedAt	string/null	Reddit creation time in ISO 8601
firstSeenAt	string/null	First observed time in ISO 8601
lastSeenAt	string/null	Last observed time in ISO 8601
isActive	boolean	Whether the source marks the ad active
sourceUrl	string	Alien Ads Library ad detail URL
scrapedAt	string	Extraction time in ISO 8601

Input

The actor accepts three simple settings.

{
  "maxItems": 100,
  "featuredOnly": false,
  "category": ""
}

maxItems

Maximum number of ad records to save.

The default is 100, while the Store prefill is 25 for a quick first run.

Allowed range: 1 to 10,000.

category

Optional exact category label from Alien Ads Library.

Leave it empty to browse ads without a category restriction.

featuredOnly

Set to true to request only records selected as featured by the source.

How to scrape Reddit ads

1. Open Alien Ads Library Scraper on Apify.
2. Choose the maximum number of ads.
3. Optionally enter an exact category or enable featured-only mode.
4. Click Start.
5. Open the Dataset tab when the run finishes.
6. Export the data or connect it to another service.

Example output

{
  "id": 2464,
  "redditId": "t3_1qeyic5",
  "redditUrl": "https://www.reddit.com/comments/1qeyic5",
  "headline": "Get 30% off the easiest way to eat healthy.",
  "adType": "sponsored",
  "advertiserUsername": "Hungryroot",
  "destinationDomain": "eat.hungryroot.com",
  "mediaUrl": "https://external-preview.redd.it/example.png",
  "firstSeenAt": "2026-01-20T15:51:34.000Z",
  "lastSeenAt": "2026-03-24T21:17:05.000Z",
  "isActive": true,
  "sourceUrl": "https://alienadslibrary.com/ads/2464-example",
  "scrapedAt": "2026-07-12T04:24:25.004Z"
}

Nullable fields are retained as null when the public catalog does not provide a value.

How much does it cost to scrape Alien Ads Library?

This actor uses pay-per-event pricing.

A small one-time start charge covers run setup, followed by a charge for each dataset item produced.

Your Apify plan receives automatic volume discounts through tiered event pricing.

The exact live price is shown before you start a run. You never pay for a requested record that is not saved.

For cost control, begin with 25 records and increase maxItems after checking the output.

Monitoring new Reddit ad creatives

Create an Apify schedule to run the actor daily or weekly.

Use redditId or id as a stable key in your destination system.

Compare firstSeenAt, lastSeenAt, and isActive to identify newly observed or persistent creatives.

Apify integrations can send every run to a webhook, Google Sheets, Make, Zapier, or another actor.

Creative research workflow

A practical creative-analysis workflow is:

1. collect 100–500 ads
2. group records by destinationDomain or advertiserUsername
3. download or reference archivedMediaUrl
4. classify headline themes with an LLM
5. compare first-seen and last-seen dates
6. save durable concepts to a swipe-file database

Long observation windows do not prove spend or performance, but they can help prioritize manual research.

Advertiser discovery workflow

Export advertiserUsername, destinationDomain, and destinationUrl.

Deduplicate domains in a spreadsheet or database.

Enrich the resulting company list with your authorized business-data provider.

This is useful for agency prospecting, market maps, and competitive landscape research.

Integrations

Google Sheets

Send dataset rows to Sheets for sorting, tagging, and collaborative review.

Make and Zapier

Trigger downstream automation after each scheduled run.

Webhooks

Receive a run-finished event and fetch the default dataset through the Apify API.

Data warehouses

Load JSON or CSV exports into BigQuery, Snowflake, PostgreSQL, or another warehouse.

Other Apify Actors

Chain this actor with authorized website extractors, text classifiers, or notification actors.

API usage

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: process.env.APIFY_TOKEN });
const run = await client.actor('automation-lab/alien-ads-library-scraper').call({
  maxItems: 100,
  featuredOnly: true,
});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

Python API example

import os
from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient(os.environ['APIFY_TOKEN'])
run = client.actor('automation-lab/alien-ads-library-scraper').call(
    run_input={'maxItems': 100, 'featuredOnly': True}
)
items = client.dataset(run['defaultDatasetId']).list_items().items
print(items)

cURL API example

curl -X POST \
  "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/automation-lab~alien-ads-library-scraper/runs?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"maxItems":100,"featuredOnly":true}'

Fetch dataset items after the run succeeds:

$curl "https://api.apify.com/v2/datasets/DATASET_ID/items?clean=true&format=json"

Use with Apify MCP

Connect the actor to Claude Code or another MCP client through Apify MCP Server.

Use this tool URL:

https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=automation-lab/alien-ads-library-scraper

Example prompts:

• “Collect 100 featured Reddit ads and group them by destination domain.”
• “Find repeated offer patterns in these Alien Ads Library records.”
• “Compare advertisers first seen in this run with last week's dataset.”

For Claude Desktop, add Apify MCP Server using the configuration instructions in the Apify Console, then enable this actor as a tool.

Tips for reliable runs

• Use a low maxItems while validating a new workflow.
• Leave category empty unless you know the exact current source label.
• Use featuredOnly for a narrower curated feed.
• Schedule moderate runs instead of repeatedly collecting the whole catalog.
• Deduplicate on redditId when combining runs.
• Treat nullable source fields as expected rather than extraction failures.
• Keep source and Reddit URLs for later verification.

Limitations

The actor exposes public records available from Alien Ads Library at run time.

It does not provide private Reddit campaign settings, spend, impressions, targeting, conversions, or advertiser contact details.

Catalog coverage and freshness are controlled by Alien Ads Library, not by this actor.

A source record can omit headline, body, category, subreddit, media, score, or destination details.

Category labels can change upstream.

Source API changes or temporary availability issues may affect a run; transient requests are retried automatically.

Data quality notes

Timestamps are converted from source Unix values to ISO 8601 UTC strings.

HTML-escaped ampersands in destination and media URLs are normalized.

isActive reflects the source flag and should not be interpreted as guaranteed real-time Reddit delivery.

creativePerformanceScore is included only when the source supplies it; the actor does not calculate that score.

Legality

This actor collects publicly accessible catalog data without bypassing login controls.

Public availability does not remove your responsibility to follow applicable laws, website terms, intellectual-property rules, and privacy obligations.

Use the data for legitimate research and processing, avoid prohibited republication, and obtain legal advice for regulated or high-risk use cases.

Do not use the actor to harass advertisers, misrepresent affiliation, or unlawfully profile people.

Troubleshooting

My dataset is empty

Check whether the category value exactly matches a current Alien Ads Library category.

Remove the category and retry a small run to distinguish a filter mismatch from source availability.

I received fewer records than requested

The selected filter may contain fewer public records, or the source may have reached the end of its current feed.

Review the run log for the saved count.

Some fields are null

Alien Ads Library does not populate every field for every ad. Nullable values are part of the source data contract.

A media URL no longer works

Try archivedMediaUrl, which may be more durable than the original Reddit-hosted URL.

A run fails temporarily

Retry after checking the public target is reachable. The actor already retries transient request failures three times.

FAQ

Does this actor require a Reddit account?

No. It reads a public third-party catalog and does not log in to Reddit.

Does it download media files?

No. It returns original and archived media URLs, keeping runs fast and exports lightweight.

Can it scrape more than one page?

Yes. Cursor pagination continues until maxItems is reached or the source has no next page.

Can I filter by advertiser?

The current release focuses on the catalog's public category and featured filters. Filter exported rows by advertiserUsername or destinationDomain downstream.

Does isActive guarantee the campaign is spending now?

No. It reproduces the source's status flag and is not a direct Reddit Ads delivery signal.

Can I run it on a schedule?

Yes. Apify schedules are ideal for repeat monitoring.

How should I identify duplicate ads?

Use redditId as the primary stable key and retain id for source reconciliation.

Related scrapers

Combine this actor with relevant Automation Lab tools when your workflow requires broader public web research:

• Reddit Scraper for public Reddit content
• Google Ads Transparency Scraper for cross-network ad research
• TikTok Creative Center Scraper for creative trend comparisons

Only use related actors when their sources and terms fit your use case.

Support

If a run behaves unexpectedly, open an issue from the actor's Apify page.

Include a small reproducible input, the run ID, expected result, and observed result.

Do not include secrets or personal credentials in support messages.