Douyin Hot Search Trends Scraper

Export the current Douyin search ranking as structured, timestamped topic records. The Actor collects up to 50 positions from Douyin's public ranking surface and returns topic text, rank, heat value, label, source time, event time, identifiers, counts, links, and retrieval time.

Use it to capture one snapshot or schedule recurring runs for China social-trend monitoring. No Douyin account, cookies, browser, or user-supplied proxy is required.

What does this Actor do?

The Actor retrieves Douyin's current hot-search list and normalizes every selected topic into one dataset row. It can:

• export the top results or a selected rank window;
• filter out topics below a minimum heat value;
• include or omit temporary cover image URLs;
• preserve both Douyin's source time and the Actor retrieval time;
• create direct Douyin search links for every topic;
• fail clearly when the upstream response is blocked, empty, or malformed.

This is a current snapshot scraper. It does not invent historical data. To build history, schedule the Actor and store each run's dataset.

Who is it for?

Typical users include:

• social-media analysts tracking fast-moving China trends;
• brand and campaign teams checking which topics are gaining attention;
• news and research teams archiving ranked topic snapshots;
• data engineers feeding trend records into a warehouse or spreadsheet;
• content teams looking beyond the top ten into the full ranking.

Why use it?

Each output row is immediately usable in JSON, CSV, Excel, webhooks, and Apify integrations. Unlike a screenshot, the data keeps rank and heat as numbers and timestamps as machine-readable ISO 8601 values.

The Actor uses a lightweight Douyin-owned JSON surface. It avoids browser startup and does not fetch video media. A sibling Douyin host provides a bounded fallback if the primary host has a transient failure.

What data can I extract?

Field	Meaning
topicText	Topic text shown in the hot-search list
rank	Current one-based rank
heatValue	Popularity value exposed by Douyin
label	Normalized badge such as Hot or New, when present
labelCode	Original numeric Douyin badge code
sourceTime	Ranking update time reported by Douyin
eventTime	Topic event time reported by Douyin
url	Direct Douyin search URL for the topic
sourceUrl	Douyin-owned API surface used for the snapshot
sentenceId	Stable topic sentence identifier
groupId	Related content group identifier
videoCount	Video count when exposed
discussVideoCount	Discussion-video count when exposed
categoryCode	Original topic category code
wordType	Original word-type code
imageUrl	Temporary cover image URL when requested
retrievedAt	Time this Actor retrieved the record

Source fields can be absent for some topics. Nullable schema fields keep these upstream variations explicit.

How to scrape Douyin hot search trends

1. Open the Actor in Apify Console.
2. Keep the default rank range for the full current list, or choose a smaller range.
3. Optionally set a minimum heat value.
4. Choose whether to include cover image URLs.
5. Click Start.
6. Open the Dataset tab to inspect, export, or integrate the results.

The default input is ready to run without credentials.

Input parameters

maxItems

Maximum records saved after filtering. Allowed range: 1–50. Default: 50.

minRank

First rank to include. Default: 1.

maxRank

Last rank to include. Allowed maximum: 50. Default: 50.

minHeat

Minimum Douyin heat value. Use 0 to keep all selected ranks. Default: 0.

includeImages

Includes a source-provided cover URL when available. These signed image URLs are temporary, so archive the image separately if your workflow needs it later. Default: true.

Input example

{
  "maxItems": 10,
  "minRank": 1,
  "maxRank": 10,
  "minHeat": 0,
  "includeImages": true
}

For ranks 11–25:

{
  "maxItems": 15,
  "minRank": 11,
  "maxRank": 25,
  "includeImages": false
}

Output example

A current result has this shape:

{
  "topicText": "Example festival travel tips",
  "rank": 1,
  "heatValue": 9876543,
  "label": "Hot",
  "labelCode": 3,
  "sourceTime": "2025-01-15T04:00:00.000Z",
  "eventTime": "2025-01-15T03:30:00.000Z",
  "url": "https://www.douyin.com/search/Example%20festival%20travel%20tips",
  "sourceUrl": "https://aweme-hl.snssdk.com/aweme/v1/hot/search/list/",
  "sentenceId": "1234567",
  "groupId": "7123456789012345678",
  "videoCount": 24,
  "discussVideoCount": 5,
  "categoryCode": 5000,
  "wordType": 1,
  "imageUrl": null,
  "retrievedAt": "2025-01-15T04:01:00.000Z"
}

Dates shown here are illustrative and anonymized. Actual runs return current Douyin data.

How much does it cost to export Douyin hot-search topics?

Pricing uses two charge events:

• a one-time Actor start charge of $0.005 per run;
• a tiered hot-search topic charge for each saved row.

At the BRONZE tier, the per-topic price is $0.005592. Approximate BRONZE examples are:

Saved topics	BRONZE estimate formula
10	$0.005 start + 10 × $0.005592/topic
25	$0.005 start + 25 × $0.005592/topic
50	$0.005 start + 50 × $0.005592/topic

The applicable tier in your Apify account can differ. The Console run estimate and active pricing are authoritative. Failed or filtered records are not charged as topic events. Platform billing can be adjusted for refunds, disputes, fraud, taxes, corrections, or clawbacks.

Scheduled trend monitoring

A single run captures the current ranking only. For recurring monitoring:

1. create an Apify Schedule;
2. run every hour or at the interval your analysis needs;
3. export each run dataset to your storage destination;
4. compare rows by sentenceId, rank, heatValue, sourceTime, and retrievedAt.

This lets you identify new topics, removed topics, rank changes, and heat changes without the Actor claiming to provide source history.

Export and integration workflows

You can:

• download JSON, CSV, XML, RSS, or Excel from the Dataset tab;
• connect the run to Google Sheets;
• trigger a webhook when the run finishes;
• use Make or Zapier for recurring delivery;
• read datasets with the Apify API client;
• load timestamped snapshots into BigQuery, Snowflake, or another warehouse.

Use sentenceId as the preferred source identifier when it is present. Use topicText plus sourceTime as a fallback comparison key.

API: cURL

Start a run synchronously and return dataset items:

curl -X POST \
  "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/automation-lab~douyin-hot-search-trends/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"maxItems":10,"minRank":1,"maxRank":10,"includeImages":false}'

Keep your Apify token in a secret or environment variable. Do not commit it to source control.

API: JavaScript

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: process.env.APIFY_TOKEN });
const run = await client.actor('automation-lab/douyin-hot-search-trends').call({
  maxItems: 50,
  minRank: 1,
  maxRank: 50,
  includeImages: false,
});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

API: Python

import os
from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient(os.environ['APIFY_TOKEN'])
run = client.actor('automation-lab/douyin-hot-search-trends').call(run_input={
    'maxItems': 25,
    'minRank': 1,
    'maxRank': 25,
    'includeImages': False,
})
items = client.dataset(run['defaultDatasetId']).list_items().items
print(items)

Use with MCP and AI assistants

The Actor itself does not use AI or send data to an AI provider. An MCP client may pass results to the model you configure.

Claude Code

Add this Actor through Apify MCP:

claude mcp add --transport http apify \
  "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=automation-lab/douyin-hot-search-trends"

Claude Desktop, Cursor, and VS Code

Claude Desktop, Cursor, and VS Code clients can use this equivalent MCP JSON configuration:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "apify": {
      "url": "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=automation-lab/douyin-hot-search-trends"
    }
  }
}

Example prompts:

• “Get the current top 10 Douyin hot searches and summarize the dominant themes.”
• “Export ranks 11–25 without images and return a CSV-ready table.”
• “Run the full snapshot and compare its IDs and ranks with yesterday's dataset.”

The comparison prompt requires you to provide or connect the earlier dataset.

Reliability and retry behavior

The Actor validates the response before saving anything. A successful upstream response must be JSON, report source status zero, and contain at least one hot-search topic.

Transient failures receive up to three requests across two Douyin-owned hosts with short exponential backoff. The Actor does not rotate paid proxies or launch a browser automatically. If all attempts fail, the run fails with a diagnostic message instead of returning a misleading empty dataset.

Limits

• Douyin currently exposes up to 50 topics through this ranking surface.
• The Actor returns current data, not historical rankings.
• Heat values and labels are source-defined and can change without notice.
• Some topic records omit counts, labels, images, or IDs.
• Cover URLs can expire.
• Douyin pages can be region-sensitive when opened outside the Actor.
• The Actor does not scrape videos, comments, profiles, or keyword search result pages.

Troubleshooting

Why did my run return fewer rows than maxItems?

Your rank window or minHeat filter may leave fewer eligible topics. The source can also expose fewer than 50 usable rows. Check the run log for the saved count.

Why is label null?

Many topics have source label code 0, meaning no displayed badge. Unknown non-zero codes are preserved as Code N and always remain available in labelCode.

Why does an image URL no longer load?

Douyin image URLs are signed and temporary. Enable images only when needed and download them during your workflow if long-term access is required.

Why did the run fail instead of returning an empty dataset?

An empty or malformed hot list is usually an upstream delivery problem, not a truthful “no trends” result. Failing clearly protects scheduled monitoring from silently recording false empty snapshots.

Legality and responsible use

This Actor retrieves publicly exposed trend-ranking metadata and is not affiliated with or endorsed by Douyin or ByteDance. You are responsible for following applicable laws, Douyin terms, Apify policies, and your organization's data-retention rules.

Do not use the output for harassment, discrimination, unlawful surveillance, or attempts to identify private individuals. Avoid treating popularity rankings as verified facts or endorsements. Review source context before publishing analysis based on a topic.

Related automation-lab Actors

For broader Douyin video and creator metrics, see Douyin Analytics Scraper. It covers a different entity and workflow: video/creator analytics rather than current ranked hot-search topics.

FAQ

Does it need a Douyin login?

No. The supported current-ranking route does not require an account or cookies.

Does it use residential proxies?

No. The shipped route uses direct lightweight HTTP requests.

Can it track rank changes automatically?

Schedule repeated runs and compare their datasets. The Actor supplies source and retrieval timestamps but does not keep a hidden cross-run history.

Can I request more than 50 topics?

No. The current source list contains at most 50 ranking positions, and the input rejects larger limits.

Can I filter by keyword?

Not in this release. Rank and heat filters are deterministic against every current snapshot; keyword filtering is easy to apply downstream without changing source coverage.