Transfermarkt Scraper

Scrape football/soccer player profiles from Transfermarkt.com — the world's leading football database. Extract market values, player stats, contract details, transfer history, and more. No API key required.

What does Transfermarkt Scraper do?

This Apify actor scrapes player profile data from Transfermarkt.com, the most comprehensive football/soccer database with market valuations for over 800,000 players worldwide.

You can either search by player name or provide direct profile URLs. The scraper extracts structured data including:

• Current market value (with numeric conversion for analysis)
• Personal details (age, nationality, height, preferred foot)
• Career info (position, current club, contract dates)
• Shirt number and profile image
• Optional: full transfer history with fees

The scraper uses plain HTTP requests with Cheerio for HTML parsing — no browser needed, keeping costs minimal.

Who is Transfermarkt Scraper for?

• Football analysts tracking player valuations and career trajectories
• Sports journalists researching player profiles for articles
• Fantasy football players comparing player stats and values
• Data scientists building football analytics datasets
• Scouts and agents monitoring player market values
• Betting analysts tracking player movements and contract status
• Academic researchers studying football economics and transfer markets

Why use Transfermarkt Scraper?

• No anti-bot protection — Transfermarkt serves plain HTML, so scraping is fast and reliable
• Structured data — Raw HTML is parsed into clean, consistent JSON fields
• Market value parsing — Converts "€15.00m" into numeric EUR values for analysis
• Multi-language support — Scrape in English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, or Portuguese
• Search + direct URL modes — Find players by name or scrape specific profiles
• Transfer history — Optionally include full transfer records with fees
• Low cost — HTTP-only, 256 MB memory, ~$0.002 per player profile
• Export anywhere — JSON, CSV, Excel, or integrate via API/webhooks

Data extracted

Field	Type	Description
url	string	Transfermarkt profile URL
playerId	string	Unique Transfermarkt player ID
name	string	Player display name
fullName	string	Full name (home country format)
dateOfBirth	string	Date of birth
age	number	Current age
nationality	string	Citizenship/nationality
height	string	Player height
position	string	Playing position
preferredFoot	string	Preferred foot (left/right/both)
currentClub	string	Current club name
clubJoinDate	string	Date joined current club
contractExpiry	string	Contract expiry date
marketValue	string	Market value display string (e.g., "€15.00m")
marketValueNumeric	number	Market value in EUR (e.g., 15000000)
shirtNumber	number	Current shirt number
imageUrl	string	Player profile photo URL
transferHistory	array	Transfer records (if enabled)
scrapedAt	string	ISO timestamp of when data was extracted

Pricing

Transfermarkt Scraper uses Apify's pay-per-event pricing:

Event	Price
Run started	$0.005 (one-time)
Player scraped	$0.002/player (varies by plan)

Volume discounts are available on higher Apify plans:

Plan	Price per player
Free	$0.0023
Bronze	$0.0020
Silver	$0.00156
Gold	$0.00120
Platinum	$0.00080
Diamond	$0.00056

Example cost: Scraping 100 players on the Bronze plan costs ~$0.205 ($0.005 start + 100 x $0.002).

How to use

1. Go to the Transfermarkt Scraper page on Apify Store
2. Enter player names in Search queries (e.g., "Lionel Messi", "Kylian Mbappe")
3. Or paste direct Transfermarkt profile URLs in Direct URLs
4. Set Max players per query to control how many results per search
5. Click Start and wait for results
6. Download data as JSON, CSV, or Excel from the Dataset tab

Input

Search mode

{
    "searchQueries": ["Lionel Messi", "Kylian Mbappe", "Erling Haaland"],
    "maxPlayersPerQuery": 5
}

Direct URL mode

{
    "startUrls": [
        "https://www.transfermarkt.com/lionel-messi/profil/spieler/28003",
        "https://www.transfermarkt.com/kylian-mbappe/profil/spieler/342229"
    ]
}

Full input with all options

{
    "searchQueries": ["Messi"],
    "startUrls": [],
    "maxPlayersPerQuery": 10,
    "language": "en",
    "includeTransferHistory": true
}

Output

Each player profile is returned as a JSON object:

{
    "url": "https://www.transfermarkt.com/lionel-messi/profil/spieler/28003",
    "playerId": "28003",
    "name": "Lionel Messi",
    "fullName": "Lionel Andres Messi",
    "dateOfBirth": "Jun 24, 1987",
    "age": 38,
    "nationality": "Argentina",
    "height": "1,69 m",
    "position": "Right Winger",
    "preferredFoot": "left",
    "currentClub": "Inter Miami CF",
    "clubJoinDate": "Jul 15, 2023",
    "contractExpiry": "Dec 31, 2025",
    "marketValue": "€15.00m",
    "marketValueNumeric": 15000000,
    "shirtNumber": 10,
    "imageUrl": "https://img.a.transfermarkt.technology/portrait/header/28003.jpg",
    "scrapedAt": "2026-03-26T12:00:00.000Z"
}

Tips for best results

• Use specific names — "Lionel Messi" works better than just "Messi" (which may return multiple players named Messi)
• Combine modes — Use search queries for discovery and direct URLs for known players
• Set maxPlayersPerQuery wisely — Lower values (1-5) for specific players, higher (10-50) for broader searches
• Enable transfer history only when needed — It doubles the number of requests per player
• Use language settings — German (de) is the original Transfermarkt language and may have the most complete data
• Rate limiting — The scraper adds 500ms delay between requests to be respectful to the server

Integrations

Connect Transfermarkt Scraper to hundreds of apps and services:

• Google Sheets — Automatically export player data to spreadsheets
• Slack/Discord — Get notifications when scraping completes
• Webhooks — Trigger downstream workflows with player data
• Zapier/Make — Connect to 5,000+ apps
• Data warehouses — Push to BigQuery, Snowflake, or PostgreSQL

API usage

Node.js

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

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

const run = await client.actor('automation-lab/transfermarkt-scraper').call({
    searchQueries: ['Lionel Messi', 'Kylian Mbappe'],
    maxPlayersPerQuery: 5,
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_API_TOKEN")

run = client.actor("automation-lab/transfermarkt-scraper").call(run_input={
    "searchQueries": ["Lionel Messi", "Kylian Mbappe"],
    "maxPlayersPerQuery": 5,
})

items = client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).list_items().items
for player in items:
    print(f"{player['name']}: {player['marketValue']}")

cURL

# Start the actor
curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/automation-lab~transfermarkt-scraper/runs?token=YOUR_API_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "searchQueries": ["Lionel Messi"],
    "maxPlayersPerQuery": 5
  }'

# Get results (replace DATASET_ID with the actual ID from the run)
curl "https://api.apify.com/v2/datasets/DATASET_ID/items?token=YOUR_API_TOKEN&format=json"

Using with MCP (Model Context Protocol)

Transfermarkt Scraper can be used as a tool in AI agents via Apify's MCP server. This allows LLMs like Claude, GPT, or Gemini to search for football player data on demand.

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "command": "npx",
            "args": ["-y", "@anthropic/apify-mcp-server"],
            "env": {
                "APIFY_TOKEN": "YOUR_API_TOKEN"
            }
        }
    }
}

Then ask your AI assistant: "Search Transfermarkt for Erling Haaland's market value and contract details."

Is it legal to scrape Transfermarkt?

Transfermarkt.com serves publicly available football data. This scraper accesses only public pages that are available to any web browser visitor. The scraper:

• Uses standard HTTP requests (same as a browser)
• Respects rate limits with built-in delays between requests
• Does not bypass any authentication or access controls
• Does not scrape personal/private user data
• Collects only publicly displayed player information

Always review Transfermarkt's Terms of Service and ensure your use case complies with applicable laws in your jurisdiction. Apify provides this tool for legitimate data collection purposes.

FAQ

Q: Does this scraper work without a proxy? A: Yes. Transfermarkt has minimal anti-bot protection. Plain HTTP requests with a User-Agent header work fine. No proxy is needed for normal usage.

Q: How many players can I scrape? A: There is no hard limit. The default timeout is 5 minutes (300 seconds), which is enough for ~500 players at 500ms delay per request. Increase the timeout for larger jobs.

Q: Can I scrape club/team data? A: The current version focuses on player profiles. Club data support may be added in future versions.

Q: What languages are supported? A: English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, and Portuguese. The language setting changes the Transfermarkt domain used.

Q: How fresh is the market value data? A: Market values on Transfermarkt are updated by the community, typically every few months per player. The scraper extracts whatever is currently displayed on the profile page.

Q: Can I schedule regular scraping? A: Yes. Use Apify's built-in scheduling to run the scraper daily, weekly, or at any custom interval.

Related scrapers

• Football Data Scraper — More football/soccer data tools
• Sports Data Scrapers — Scrapers for other sports