Apify Store Analyzer

Analyze competing actors in the Apify Store by keyword. Compare pricing models, user counts, run statistics, ratings, and market positioning for competitive intelligence.

What does Apify Store Analyzer do?

Apify Store Analyzer searches the Apify Store for actors matching your keywords and produces a structured competitive analysis for each result. It fetches pricing details, user/run statistics, ratings, categories, and technical specs, then classifies each actor's market position (leader/challenger/niche/newcomer) and pricing tier.

It uses the public Apify Store API — no scraping, no authentication required beyond a standard Apify token.

Use cases

• Actor developers — Research competitors before building a new actor
• Pricing decisions — Compare PPE/subscription/free pricing across competing actors
• Market analysis — Find gaps and underserved niches in the Apify Store
• Portfolio tracking — Monitor how competing actors grow over time
• Due diligence — Evaluate actor quality before integrating into workflows

Why use Apify Store Analyzer?

• One search, full competitive matrix — All key metrics in a single dataset
• Market classification — Automatic leader/challenger/niche/newcomer positioning
• Pricing breakdown — PPE events, subscription tiers, and free actors all normalized
• Multi-keyword search — Analyze multiple market segments in a single run
• Deduplication — Actors appearing across multiple keywords are only analyzed once

Input parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
searchKeywords	string[]	Yes	—	Keywords to search the Apify Store (e.g., "youtube scraper", "email finder")
maxActorsPerKeyword	integer	No	20	Maximum actors to analyze per keyword
includeRunStats	boolean	No	true	Fetch detailed stats per actor (adds ~1 API call each)

Output example

{
    "searchKeyword": "youtube scraper",
    "rank": 1,
    "actorId": "abc123",
    "actorName": "youtube-scraper",
    "actorSlug": "publisher/youtube-scraper",
    "username": "publisher",
    "actorUrl": "https://apify.com/publisher/youtube-scraper",
    "title": "YouTube Scraper",
    "description": "Scrape YouTube videos, channels, and playlists...",
    "isPublic": true,
    "isDeprecated": false,
    "pricingModel": "PAY_PER_EVENT",
    "startEventPrice": 0.01,
    "perItemEventName": "video-scraped",
    "perItemEventPrice": 0.003,
    "pricingDetails": "start=$0.01, video-scraped=$0.003",
    "totalUsers": 55000,
    "totalRuns": 12000000,
    "monthlyUsers": 3200,
    "quarterlyUsers": 8500,
    "avgRating": 4.8,
    "reviewCount": 125,
    "totalBuilds": 85,
    "defaultMemoryMbytes": 4096,
    "defaultTimeoutSecs": 3600,
    "lastUpdate": "2026-02-28T10:00:00.000Z",
    "categories": ["SOCIAL_MEDIA"],
    "marketPosition": "leader",
    "pricingTier": "mid",
    "analyzedAt": "2026-03-01T20:00:00.000Z"
}

Market position classification

Position	Criteria
leader	1,000+ users or 100,000+ runs
challenger	100+ users or 10,000+ runs
niche	10+ users or 1,000+ runs
newcomer	Below all thresholds

Pricing tier classification

Tier	Criteria
free	FREE pricing model
subscription	FLAT_PRICE_PER_MONTH
per-result	PRICE_PER_DATASET_ITEM
budget	PPE per-item event <= $0.002
mid	PPE per-item event $0.002-$0.01
premium	PPE per-item event > $0.01

How to analyze Apify Store competitors

1. Go to Apify Store Analyzer on Apify Store and click Try for free.
2. Enter one or more search keywords (e.g., "youtube scraper", "email finder").
3. Set the maximum number of actors to analyze per keyword.
4. Click Start and wait for the run to finish.
5. Download your competitive analysis as JSON, CSV, or Excel from the Dataset tab.

How much does it cost to analyze Apify Store actors?

This actor uses pay-per-event pricing:

Event	Price	Description
Actor start	$0.035	Charged once per run
Actor analyzed	$0.002	Charged per Store actor analyzed

Example costs:

• 10 actors (1 keyword): $0.035 + (10 x $0.002) = $0.055
• 50 actors (3 keywords): $0.035 + (50 x $0.002) = $0.135

Using the Apify API

cURL

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/automation-lab~apify-store-analyzer/runs?token=YOUR_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"searchKeywords": ["youtube scraper"], "maxActorsPerKeyword": 10}'

Node.js

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_API_TOKEN' });

const run = await client.actor('YOUR_ACTOR_ID').call({
    searchKeywords: ['youtube scraper', 'video downloader'],
    maxActorsPerKeyword: 20,
    includeRunStats: true,
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.log(`#${item.rank} ${item.actorSlug} — ${item.totalUsers} users, ${item.pricingModel}, ${item.marketPosition}`);
});

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_API_TOKEN")

run = client.actor("YOUR_ACTOR_ID").call(run_input={
    "searchKeywords": ["youtube scraper"],
    "maxActorsPerKeyword": 20,
})

for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(f"#{item['rank']} {item['actorSlug']} — {item['totalUsers']} users, {item['pricingModel']}")

Integrations

• Google Sheets — Export competitive analysis to spreadsheets for team review
• Webhooks — Get notified when new competitors appear in your category
• n8n / Make — Automate weekly competitive monitoring workflows

Use with Claude AI (MCP)

You can connect Apify Store Analyzer to Claude AI as an MCP tool, enabling Claude to research competing actors during conversations.

Setup

Add the Apify MCP server using the Claude CLI:

$claude mcp add apify-store-analyzer -- npx -y @anthropic-ai/apify-mcp-server@latest automation-lab/apify-store-analyzer

Or add it to your Claude Desktop config (claude_desktop_config.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "apify-store-analyzer": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@anthropic-ai/apify-mcp-server@latest", "automation-lab/apify-store-analyzer"],
      "env": { "APIFY_TOKEN": "YOUR_TOKEN" }
    }
  }
}

Example prompts for Claude

• "Analyze the top actors in the Apify Store scraping category"
• "Get stats and pricing for YouTube scraper actors on Apify"
• "Compare the market positioning of email finder actors"

Tips and best practices

• Use multiple keywords to cover different ways users might search for your category
• Compare monthlyUsers trends to spot growing competitors
• Actors with high totalRuns but low totalUsers have sticky power users
• Check lastUpdate to find abandoned actors — market opportunity for a maintained alternative
• Use pricingTier to find pricing gaps (e.g., no budget option in a category)

FAQ

The actor returns fewer results than expected for my keyword. The Apify Store API returns actors ranked by relevance. If your keyword is very specific, there may be fewer matching actors. Try broader search terms or multiple keyword variations.

Some actors show totalUsers: 0 or totalRuns: 0. Run statistics require the includeRunStats option to be enabled. Some very new or private actors may not expose usage statistics through the public API.

Other automation and analysis tools

• Scraper Regression Watchdog — Monitor your scrapers for regressions and data quality issues.
• Website Change Monitor — Detect changes on any web page and get notified.
• Anti-Blocking Diagnostics — Test URLs against multiple access methods to diagnose scraper blocking.

Compliance

This actor uses the public Apify Store API (api.apify.com/v2/store) and the public actor detail endpoint (api.apify.com/v2/acts/{id}). No private data is accessed. No web scraping is performed.