# GitHub Scraper (`brilliant_gum/github-scraper`) Actor
Scrapes GitHub repositories, users, trending repos, issues and code via the GitHub REST API v3. Supports authentication tokens for higher rate limits (5000 req/hr vs 60 req/hr unauthenticated). Includes smart analytics: language distribution, license distribution, stars histogram, activity scores...
- **URL**: https://apify.com/brilliant\_gum/github-scraper.md
- **Developed by:** [Yuliia Kulakova](https://apify.com/brilliant_gum) (community)
- **Categories:** Developer tools
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, NaN bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet
## Pricing
from $30.00 / 1,000 results
This Actor is paid per event and usage. You are charged both the fixed price for specific events and for Apify platform usage.
Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/platform/actors/running/actors-in-store#pay-per-event
## What's an Apify Actor?
Actors are a software tools running on the Apify platform, for all kinds of web data extraction and automation use cases.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.
Actors are written with capital "A".
## How to integrate an Actor?
If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.
The best way to integrate Actors is as follows.
In JavaScript/TypeScript projects, use official [JavaScript/TypeScript client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js.md):
```bash
npm install apify-client
```
In Python projects, use official [Python client library](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python.md):
```bash
pip install apify-client
```
In shell scripts, use [Apify CLI](https://docs.apify.com/cli/docs.md):
````bash
# MacOS / Linux
curl -fsSL https://apify.com/install-cli.sh | bash
# Windows
irm https://apify.com/install-cli.ps1 | iex
```bash
In AI frameworks, you might use the [Apify MCP server](https://docs.apify.com/platform/integrations/mcp.md).
If your project is in a different language, use the [REST API](https://docs.apify.com/api/v2.md).
For usage examples, see the [API](#api) section below.
For more details, see Apify documentation as [Markdown index](https://docs.apify.com/llms.txt) and [Markdown full-text](https://docs.apify.com/llms-full.txt).
# README
## GitHub Scraper
Collect structured data from GitHub — repositories, developers, issues, and trending projects. Get everything you need for market research, competitive analysis, and tech talent sourcing in one place.
### What can you scrape?
#### 🔍 Search Repositories
Find repositories by keywords, language, stars, forks, date range, and topics. Perfect for mapping the competitive landscape or discovering open-source tools in any domain.
#### 👥 Search Users
Discover developers and organizations by keyword. Ideal for tech recruiting, community research, and identifying key contributors in specific technology areas.
#### 🐛 Search Issues & Pull Requests
Find open issues and PRs across all of GitHub. Great for tracking bugs, feature requests, and contribution opportunities in your target projects.
#### 🔥 Trending Repositories
See what's hot on GitHub right now — daily, weekly, or monthly trending repos with growth rates. Filter by programming language to focus on your tech stack.
#### 📦 Repository Details
Deep-dive into any repository with full metadata: contributors, latest releases, language breakdown, open PR count, commit count, and more.
#### 👤 User Details
Get complete developer profiles with their public repositories, contribution stats, and activity overview.
### Built-in analytics
Every scrape automatically includes a summary with:
- **Language distribution** — which programming languages dominate your results
- **License breakdown** — MIT, Apache, GPL and other license usage
- **Stars histogram** — distribution from small projects to mega-repos
- **Activity scores** — identify the most actively maintained projects
- **Top topics** — most popular tags across your results
- **Growth rates** — star growth trends for trending repos
### How much does it cost?
The GitHub Scraper is available on a **pay-per-result** basis at **$0.03 per result**. Each repository, user, or issue returned counts as one result. The analytics summary is included with every run at no extra charge.
**Example costs:**
| Scenario | Results | Cost |
|----------|---------|------|
| Top 100 ML repos | 100 | $3.00 |
| Daily trending repos | ~25 | $0.75 |
| Single repo deep-dive | 1 | $0.03 |
| 1000 Python repos | 1000 | $30.00 |
### Powerful filtering options
- **Language filter** — focus on Python, JavaScript, Rust, Go, or any language
- **Stars & forks minimums** — skip small projects, find established ones
- **Date ranges** — repos created or updated within specific timeframes
- **Topics** — filter by tags like "machine-learning", "api", "devops"
- **Sort options** — by stars, forks, update date, or best match
### Enrich your data
Enable optional enrichment for deeper insights:
- **Contributors** — top 30 contributors with commit counts
- **Releases** — latest release info with download counts
- **Language breakdown** — bytes and percentages per language
- **Commit count** — total commits in the repository
- **Open PRs** — number of open pull requests
### Works without a token
The scraper works out of the box — no GitHub account or token required. For larger scrapes, add your Personal Access Token to increase the rate limit from 60 to 5,000 requests per hour.
### Use cases
**Market research** — Map the open-source landscape in any technology area. Compare frameworks, libraries, and tools by popularity, maintenance activity, and community size.
**Tech recruiting** — Find active developers in specific technologies. Identify top contributors to popular projects and review their public profiles.
**Competitive intelligence** — Track trending projects, monitor star growth, and discover emerging tools before they go mainstream.
**Academic research** — Collect datasets about open-source software ecosystems, collaboration patterns, and technology adoption trends.
**Investment analysis** — Evaluate open-source traction for developer tools and infrastructure startups by tracking stars, forks, and community engagement.
### Input examples
**Search for machine learning repos with 1000+ stars:**
```json
{
"mode": "search_repos",
"query": "machine learning",
"minStars": 1000,
"language": "python",
"maxResults": 50
}
````
**Get daily trending repos:**
```json
{
"mode": "trending",
"trendingPeriod": "daily"
}
```
**Deep-dive into a specific repo:**
```json
{
"mode": "repo_details",
"query": "facebook/react",
"includeContributors": true,
"includeReleases": true,
"includeLanguageStats": true
}
```
### Output sample
Each repository result includes:
```json
{
"fullName": "facebook/react",
"stars": 245101,
"forks": 51060,
"language": "JavaScript",
"description": "The library for web and native user interfaces.",
"htmlUrl": "https://github.com/facebook/react",
"license": "MIT",
"topics": ["react", "javascript", "frontend", "ui"],
"createdAt": "2013-05-24",
"updatedAt": "2026-05-18"
}
```
# Actor input Schema
## `mode` (type: `string`):
What to scrape from GitHub.
## `query` (type: `string`):
Search query string. For repo\_details use 'owner/repo' format (e.g. 'torvalds/linux'). For user\_details use a GitHub username. For search modes use keywords and qualifiers (e.g. 'machine learning stars:>1000').
## `githubToken` (type: `string`):
Your GitHub Personal Access Token for higher rate limits (5000 req/hr vs 60 req/hr unauthenticated). Generate at https://github.com/settings/tokens. Token is NOT stored or logged.
## `language` (type: `string`):
Filter repositories by primary programming language (e.g. 'javascript', 'python', 'rust'). Leave empty for all languages.
## `minStars` (type: `integer`):
Only include repositories with at least this many stars.
## `minForks` (type: `integer`):
Only include repositories with at least this many forks.
## `dateCreatedFrom` (type: `string`):
Include only repositories created on or after this date (ISO 8601 format: YYYY-MM-DD).
## `dateCreatedTo` (type: `string`):
Include only repositories created on or before this date (ISO 8601 format: YYYY-MM-DD).
## `dateUpdatedFrom` (type: `string`):
Include only repositories last updated on or after this date (ISO 8601 format: YYYY-MM-DD).
## `dateUpdatedTo` (type: `string`):
Include only repositories last updated on or before this date (ISO 8601 format: YYYY-MM-DD).
## `topics` (type: `array`):
Filter repositories that have ALL of these topics. Each item is a topic name.
## `maxResults` (type: `integer`):
Maximum number of results to return. GitHub Search API returns up to 1000 results per query.
## `trendingPeriod` (type: `string`):
Time period for trending repositories (only used in 'trending' mode).
## `trendingLanguage` (type: `string`):
Filter trending repositories by programming language slug (only used in 'trending' mode). Leave empty for all languages. Use slug format: 'javascript', 'python', 'c++', etc.
## `includeContributors` (type: `boolean`):
Fetch top 30 contributors for each repository, plus an approximate total contributor count. Makes one additional API call per repository.
## `includeReleases` (type: `boolean`):
Fetch the latest release information for each repository (tag name, publish date, download count). Makes one additional API call per repository.
## `includeTopics` (type: `boolean`):
Include repository topics (tags) in the output.
## `includeLanguageStats` (type: `boolean`):
Fetch per-language byte breakdown for each repository (e.g. {language: 'Python', bytes: 34000, percentage: 72.4}). Always enabled in repo\_details mode. Makes one additional API call per repository in other modes.
## `includeCommitCount` (type: `boolean`):
Fetch the approximate total commit count for the repository. Only available in repo\_details mode. Uses Link header pagination trick — one additional API call.
## `includeOpenPRCount` (type: `boolean`):
Fetch the number of open pull requests for the repository. Only available in repo\_details mode. Uses GitHub Search API — one additional API call.
## `sortBy` (type: `string`):
Sort search results by this field (applies to search\_repos, search\_users, and search\_issues modes).
## `order` (type: `string`):
Sort order for results.
## Actor input object example
```json
{
"mode": "search_repos",
"query": "machine learning",
"githubToken": "ghp_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx",
"language": "python",
"minStars": 100,
"minForks": 10,
"dateCreatedFrom": "2020-01-01",
"dateCreatedTo": "2024-12-31",
"dateUpdatedFrom": "2024-01-01",
"dateUpdatedTo": "2024-12-31",
"topics": [
"machine-learning",
"python"
],
"maxResults": 100,
"trendingPeriod": "daily",
"trendingLanguage": "javascript",
"includeContributors": false,
"includeReleases": false,
"includeTopics": true,
"includeLanguageStats": false,
"includeCommitCount": false,
"includeOpenPRCount": false,
"sortBy": "stars",
"order": "desc"
}
```
# Actor output Schema
## `results` (type: `string`):
No description
# API
You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.
## JavaScript example
```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';
// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
token: '',
});
// Prepare Actor input
const input = {
"query": "machine learning"
};
// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("brilliant_gum/github-scraper").call(input);
// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
console.dir(item);
});
// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs
```
## Python example
```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient
# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("")
# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = { "query": "machine learning" }
# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("brilliant_gum/github-scraper").call(run_input=run_input)
# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print("💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/" + run["defaultDatasetId"])
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
print(item)
# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start
```
## CLI example
```bash
echo '{
"query": "machine learning"
}' |
apify call brilliant_gum/github-scraper --silent --output-dataset
```
## MCP server setup
```json
{
"mcpServers": {
"apify": {
"command": "npx",
"args": [
"mcp-remote",
"https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=brilliant_gum/github-scraper",
"--header",
"Authorization: Bearer "
]
}
}
}
```
## OpenAPI specification
```json
{
"openapi": "3.0.1",
"info": {
"title": "GitHub Scraper",
"description": "Scrapes GitHub repositories, users, trending repos, issues and code via the GitHub REST API v3. Supports authentication tokens for higher rate limits (5000 req/hr vs 60 req/hr unauthenticated). Includes smart analytics: language distribution, license distribution, stars histogram, activity scores...",
"version": "1.0",
"x-build-id": "oj2ocUeUWNFKMZJZq"
},
"servers": [
{
"url": "https://api.apify.com/v2"
}
],
"paths": {
"/acts/brilliant_gum~github-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items": {
"post": {
"operationId": "run-sync-get-dataset-items-brilliant_gum-github-scraper",
"x-openai-isConsequential": false,
"summary": "Executes an Actor, waits for its completion, and returns Actor's dataset items in response.",
"tags": [
"Run Actor"
],
"requestBody": {
"required": true,
"content": {
"application/json": {
"schema": {
"$ref": "#/components/schemas/inputSchema"
}
}
}
},
"parameters": [
{
"name": "token",
"in": "query",
"required": true,
"schema": {
"type": "string"
},
"description": "Enter your Apify token here"
}
],
"responses": {
"200": {
"description": "OK"
}
}
}
},
"/acts/brilliant_gum~github-scraper/runs": {
"post": {
"operationId": "runs-sync-brilliant_gum-github-scraper",
"x-openai-isConsequential": false,
"summary": "Executes an Actor and returns information about the initiated run in response.",
"tags": [
"Run Actor"
],
"requestBody": {
"required": true,
"content": {
"application/json": {
"schema": {
"$ref": "#/components/schemas/inputSchema"
}
}
}
},
"parameters": [
{
"name": "token",
"in": "query",
"required": true,
"schema": {
"type": "string"
},
"description": "Enter your Apify token here"
}
],
"responses": {
"200": {
"description": "OK",
"content": {
"application/json": {
"schema": {
"$ref": "#/components/schemas/runsResponseSchema"
}
}
}
}
}
}
},
"/acts/brilliant_gum~github-scraper/run-sync": {
"post": {
"operationId": "run-sync-brilliant_gum-github-scraper",
"x-openai-isConsequential": false,
"summary": "Executes an Actor, waits for completion, and returns the OUTPUT from Key-value store in response.",
"tags": [
"Run Actor"
],
"requestBody": {
"required": true,
"content": {
"application/json": {
"schema": {
"$ref": "#/components/schemas/inputSchema"
}
}
}
},
"parameters": [
{
"name": "token",
"in": "query",
"required": true,
"schema": {
"type": "string"
},
"description": "Enter your Apify token here"
}
],
"responses": {
"200": {
"description": "OK"
}
}
}
}
},
"components": {
"schemas": {
"inputSchema": {
"type": "object",
"required": [
"mode"
],
"properties": {
"mode": {
"title": "Scraping Mode",
"enum": [
"search_repos",
"search_users",
"trending",
"repo_details",
"user_details",
"search_issues"
],
"type": "string",
"description": "What to scrape from GitHub.",
"default": "search_repos"
},
"query": {
"title": "Search Query",
"type": "string",
"description": "Search query string. For repo_details use 'owner/repo' format (e.g. 'torvalds/linux'). For user_details use a GitHub username. For search modes use keywords and qualifiers (e.g. 'machine learning stars:>1000')."
},
"githubToken": {
"title": "GitHub Personal Access Token (Optional)",
"type": "string",
"description": "Your GitHub Personal Access Token for higher rate limits (5000 req/hr vs 60 req/hr unauthenticated). Generate at https://github.com/settings/tokens. Token is NOT stored or logged."
},
"language": {
"title": "Programming Language Filter",
"type": "string",
"description": "Filter repositories by primary programming language (e.g. 'javascript', 'python', 'rust'). Leave empty for all languages."
},
"minStars": {
"title": "Minimum Stars",
"minimum": 0,
"type": "integer",
"description": "Only include repositories with at least this many stars.",
"default": 0
},
"minForks": {
"title": "Minimum Forks",
"minimum": 0,
"type": "integer",
"description": "Only include repositories with at least this many forks.",
"default": 0
},
"dateCreatedFrom": {
"title": "Created From Date",
"type": "string",
"description": "Include only repositories created on or after this date (ISO 8601 format: YYYY-MM-DD)."
},
"dateCreatedTo": {
"title": "Created To Date",
"type": "string",
"description": "Include only repositories created on or before this date (ISO 8601 format: YYYY-MM-DD)."
},
"dateUpdatedFrom": {
"title": "Updated From Date",
"type": "string",
"description": "Include only repositories last updated on or after this date (ISO 8601 format: YYYY-MM-DD)."
},
"dateUpdatedTo": {
"title": "Updated To Date",
"type": "string",
"description": "Include only repositories last updated on or before this date (ISO 8601 format: YYYY-MM-DD)."
},
"topics": {
"title": "Topics Filter",
"type": "array",
"description": "Filter repositories that have ALL of these topics. Each item is a topic name.",
"items": {
"type": "string"
}
},
"maxResults": {
"title": "Maximum Results",
"minimum": 1,
"maximum": 1000,
"type": "integer",
"description": "Maximum number of results to return. GitHub Search API returns up to 1000 results per query.",
"default": 100
},
"trendingPeriod": {
"title": "Trending Period",
"enum": [
"daily",
"weekly",
"monthly"
],
"type": "string",
"description": "Time period for trending repositories (only used in 'trending' mode).",
"default": "daily"
},
"trendingLanguage": {
"title": "Trending Language Filter",
"type": "string",
"description": "Filter trending repositories by programming language slug (only used in 'trending' mode). Leave empty for all languages. Use slug format: 'javascript', 'python', 'c++', etc."
},
"includeContributors": {
"title": "Include Contributors",
"type": "boolean",
"description": "Fetch top 30 contributors for each repository, plus an approximate total contributor count. Makes one additional API call per repository.",
"default": false
},
"includeReleases": {
"title": "Include Latest Release",
"type": "boolean",
"description": "Fetch the latest release information for each repository (tag name, publish date, download count). Makes one additional API call per repository.",
"default": false
},
"includeTopics": {
"title": "Include Topics",
"type": "boolean",
"description": "Include repository topics (tags) in the output.",
"default": true
},
"includeLanguageStats": {
"title": "Include Language Breakdown",
"type": "boolean",
"description": "Fetch per-language byte breakdown for each repository (e.g. {language: 'Python', bytes: 34000, percentage: 72.4}). Always enabled in repo_details mode. Makes one additional API call per repository in other modes.",
"default": false
},
"includeCommitCount": {
"title": "Include Commit Count",
"type": "boolean",
"description": "Fetch the approximate total commit count for the repository. Only available in repo_details mode. Uses Link header pagination trick — one additional API call.",
"default": false
},
"includeOpenPRCount": {
"title": "Include Open PR Count",
"type": "boolean",
"description": "Fetch the number of open pull requests for the repository. Only available in repo_details mode. Uses GitHub Search API — one additional API call.",
"default": false
},
"sortBy": {
"title": "Sort By",
"enum": [
"stars",
"forks",
"updated",
"help-wanted-issues",
"best-match"
],
"type": "string",
"description": "Sort search results by this field (applies to search_repos, search_users, and search_issues modes).",
"default": "stars"
},
"order": {
"title": "Sort Order",
"enum": [
"desc",
"asc"
],
"type": "string",
"description": "Sort order for results.",
"default": "desc"
}
}
},
"runsResponseSchema": {
"type": "object",
"properties": {
"data": {
"type": "object",
"properties": {
"id": {
"type": "string"
},
"actId": {
"type": "string"
},
"userId": {
"type": "string"
},
"startedAt": {
"type": "string",
"format": "date-time",
"example": "2025-01-08T00:00:00.000Z"
},
"finishedAt": {
"type": "string",
"format": "date-time",
"example": "2025-01-08T00:00:00.000Z"
},
"status": {
"type": "string",
"example": "READY"
},
"meta": {
"type": "object",
"properties": {
"origin": {
"type": "string",
"example": "API"
},
"userAgent": {
"type": "string"
}
}
},
"stats": {
"type": "object",
"properties": {
"inputBodyLen": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 2000
},
"rebootCount": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"restartCount": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"resurrectCount": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"computeUnits": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
}
}
},
"options": {
"type": "object",
"properties": {
"build": {
"type": "string",
"example": "latest"
},
"timeoutSecs": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 300
},
"memoryMbytes": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 1024
},
"diskMbytes": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 2048
}
}
},
"buildId": {
"type": "string"
},
"defaultKeyValueStoreId": {
"type": "string"
},
"defaultDatasetId": {
"type": "string"
},
"defaultRequestQueueId": {
"type": "string"
},
"buildNumber": {
"type": "string",
"example": "1.0.0"
},
"containerUrl": {
"type": "string"
},
"usage": {
"type": "object",
"properties": {
"ACTOR_COMPUTE_UNITS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"DATASET_READS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"DATASET_WRITES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"KEY_VALUE_STORE_READS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"KEY_VALUE_STORE_WRITES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 1
},
"KEY_VALUE_STORE_LISTS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"REQUEST_QUEUE_READS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"REQUEST_QUEUE_WRITES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"DATA_TRANSFER_INTERNAL_GBYTES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"DATA_TRANSFER_EXTERNAL_GBYTES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"PROXY_RESIDENTIAL_TRANSFER_GBYTES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"PROXY_SERPS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
}
}
},
"usageTotalUsd": {
"type": "number",
"example": 0.00005
},
"usageUsd": {
"type": "object",
"properties": {
"ACTOR_COMPUTE_UNITS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"DATASET_READS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"DATASET_WRITES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"KEY_VALUE_STORE_READS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"KEY_VALUE_STORE_WRITES": {
"type": "number",
"example": 0.00005
},
"KEY_VALUE_STORE_LISTS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"REQUEST_QUEUE_READS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"REQUEST_QUEUE_WRITES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"DATA_TRANSFER_INTERNAL_GBYTES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"DATA_TRANSFER_EXTERNAL_GBYTES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"PROXY_RESIDENTIAL_TRANSFER_GBYTES": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
},
"PROXY_SERPS": {
"type": "integer",
"example": 0
}
}
}
}
}
}
}
}
}
}
```