UK Care Home Directory Scraper (CQC)

Scrape the official register of nursing and residential care homes in England, sourced directly from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) — the UK government body that regulates and inspects every health and social care provider in the country. Search by region, local authority, care specialism (e.g. dementia), keyword or postcode, and optionally fetch each home's official inspection rating (Outstanding / Good / Requires improvement / Inadequate). No login, no API key, no proxy required.

What this actor does

• Two modes: search (filter the full directory) and byLocationIds (look up specific homes by their CQC Location ID, always enriched with ratings)
• Filters: keyword (name), provider/operator name, region, local authority, care home type (nursing vs residential), specialism/care need, postcode area
• Official inspection ratings: Overall, Safe, Effective, Caring, Responsive, Well-led — straight from CQC's own published assessments
• Sorting: alphabetical or most-recently-inspected-first
• Always fresh: the directory export is re-downloaded from CQC every run (CQC republishes it daily)
• Empty fields are omitted — every record only contains what CQC actually published for that home

Output per care home

Field	Description
name	Registered care home name
alsoKnownAs	Trading/brand name, if different from the registered name
address	Street address
postcode	UK postcode
fullAddress	Address + postcode combined
phone	UK phone number
website	Care home or provider website
serviceTypes[]	e.g. Nursing homes, Residential homes
specialisms[]	Care needs supported, e.g. Dementia, Physical disabilities
providerName	Operating company / charity name
providerId, providerUrl	CQC provider ID and profile page
localAuthority	English local authority area
region	One of CQC's 9 English regions
latestInspectionDate	Date of CQC's most recent inspection (ISO date)
locationId	CQC Location ID
locationUrl / sourceUrl	Canonical CQC page for this care home
overallRating *	Outstanding / Good / Requires improvement / Inadequate
ratingSafe, ratingEffective, ratingCaring, ratingResponsive, ratingWellLed *	The 5 official CQC assessment categories
reportPublishedDate *	Date the latest inspection report was published
reportUrl *	Link to the full inspection report
regulatedActivities[] *	CQC-regulated activities this location is registered to carry out, e.g. Accommodation for persons who require nursing or personal care, Treatment of disease, disorder or injury
registeredManagers[] *	Named registered manager(s) on file
nominatedIndividuals[] *	Named nominated individual(s) on file — the person the provider has made accountable for compliance at this location
recordType	Always careHome
scrapedAt	UTC timestamp of the scrape

* Only present when ratings are fetched — see includeRatings below. Always present for mode=byLocationIds.

Input

Field	Type	Default	Description
mode	select	search	search or byLocationIds
keyword	string	–	Substring match on name / "also known as"
providerName	string	–	Substring match on provider/operator name
region	select	–	One of CQC's 9 English regions
localAuthority	select	–	One of 152 English local authorities
serviceType	select	–	Nursing homes or Residential homes
specialism	select	–	One of 12 CQC-listed specialisms (e.g. Dementia)
postcodeArea	string	–	Postcode prefix match, e.g. NE31, SW1
sortBy	select	name	name (A-Z) or latestInspectionDateDesc
includeRatings	boolean	false	Fetch each result's official CQC rating (capped at 60 fetches/run)
locationIds	array	–	CQC Location IDs or URLs (mode=byLocationIds)
maxItems	integer	20	Hard cap on emitted records (1–500)

Example: dementia care homes in London, with ratings

{
  "mode": "search",
  "region": "London",
  "specialism": "Dementia",
  "includeRatings": true,
  "maxItems": 25
}

Example: all care homes run by a specific provider

{
  "mode": "search",
  "providerName": "Barchester",
  "sortBy": "latestInspectionDateDesc",
  "maxItems": 100
}

Example: look up specific care homes by CQC Location ID

{
  "mode": "byLocationIds",
  "locationIds": [
    "1-10557588274",
    "https://www.cqc.org.uk/location/1-4843681933"
  ]
}

Use cases

• Care research & comparison — build a shortlist of highly-rated homes in a specific area or specialism
• Lead generation — identify care providers by region, local authority, or operator group
• Market research — analyse the density and quality distribution of care provision across England
• Compliance monitoring — track inspection dates and ratings for homes you operate or oversee
• Family/carer decision support — compare nearby homes on official ratings before choosing care

FAQ

Where does this data come from? Directly from CQC's own public transparency data — the same regulator-verified register CQC publishes for public download every day. This is the official UK government source of truth for registered care providers, not a third-party aggregator.

Does this cover all of the UK? CQC regulates England only. Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland have their own regulators (Care Inspectorate, CIW, RQIA) which are not covered by this actor.

What's the difference between a nursing home and a residential home? A nursing home has registered nurses on-site and can provide medical/nursing care; a residential home provides personal care (help with daily living) without nursing care. Some homes are registered for both.

Why do some homes have no rating? CQC ratings are assigned after an inspection. Newly registered homes, or homes whose most recent assessment didn't produce a published overall rating, will have overallRating omitted rather than a fabricated placeholder.

How current is the data? The base directory (name, address, provider, specialisms) is CQC's daily-refreshed export. Ratings are fetched live from each home's CQC page at the time you run the actor.

Why is includeRatings capped at 60 fetches per run? Fetching a rating requires one extra page load per care home. The cap keeps runs fast and reliable; use mode=byLocationIds for guaranteed per-home rating lookups regardless of this cap.

Can I search by exact postcode? postcodeArea matches on prefix (e.g. NE31 matches NE31 1YQ). For an exact single address lookup, use keyword with the care home's name instead.