WooCommerce Catalog Monitor

Who it's for: ecommerce teams, dropshippers, and competitor-research analysts who need to know the moment a WooCommerce store's prices, stock, or product lineup changes — without re-scraping the whole site on every check.

Track any WooCommerce store's catalog over time: new products, removed products, price changes, and stock flips — from the store's public catalog data, with no login, no browser, and nothing to break when a store redesigns its theme. Maintained against WooCommerce changes so your schedule keeps working.

Run it once to record a baseline, then schedule it (daily, hourly — your call). Every scheduled run diffs the live catalog against the last snapshot and pushes one row per change. The first run for a store never charges for changes.

What it monitors

Change type	Meaning
new	Product appeared in the catalog
removed	Product disappeared from the catalog
price_changed	Price (or currency) changed — old and new values included
stock_changed	Stock status flipped (e.g. instock → outofstock)

Each change row carries the product name, SKU, permalink, prices, stock status, and detection timestamp. Every run also writes a store-summary row per store with counts.

Pricing — pay per event, no subscription

Event	Price
Run started	$0.001 per run
Product checked	$0.0002 per product read ($0.20 per 1,000)
Change detected	$0.005 per new / removed / price-changed / stock-flipped product

Typical run: a 1,000-product store with 10 changes costs about $0.25 ($0.001 run + $0.20 products + $0.05 changes).

Failed stores (unsupported, private/B2B, network errors) return an error row and are not charged. Set Maximum charge per run and the actor stops cleanly before exceeding it.

Example input

{
  "storeUrls": ["https://your-store.com"],
  "maxProductsPerStore": 1000,
  "outputMode": "changes",
  "stateName": "woo-catalog-monitor",
  "maxChargeUsd": 5
}

Example output (one row per change)

Prices are in the store currency's minor units (e.g. cents), exactly as the store reports them.

{
  "recordType": "change",
  "store": "https://your-store.com",
  "storeUrl": "https://your-store.com",
  "productId": "1234",
  "changeType": "price_changed",
  "name": "Ceramic Mug - 12oz",
  "sku": "MUG-12",
  "price": 1650,
  "regular_price": 1650,
  "sale_price": 1650,
  "oldPrice": 1400,
  "currency": "USD",
  "oldCurrency": "USD",
  "stock_status": "instock",
  "is_in_stock": true,
  "permalink": "https://your-store.com/product/ceramic-mug-12oz",
  "detectedAt": "2026-10-16T09:00:00+00:00"
}

Input

• Store URLs — one or more WooCommerce store URLs, e.g. https://competitor-store.com.
• Max products per store (default 1,000) — caps catalog reads and your per-run cost.
• Output mode — Changes only (one row per change; best for monitoring) or Full catalog snapshot (every product).
• Snapshot store name — the named key-value store holding baselines. Keep it constant across scheduled runs; change it to start a fresh baseline.
• Maximum charge per run (USD) (default $5) — hard spending cap.

Requirements and limits

• Works with the large majority of public WooCommerce stores. Private, password-protected, and B2B stores are reported as unsupported, not charged.
• Prices are reported in the store's own currency.
• Polite by design: light, paced reads, far lighter on the store than page-by-page scraping.

Use it from code

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/dheerajitbhu~woocommerce-catalog-monitor/run-sync-get-dataset-items" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"storeUrls": ["https://competitor-store.com"], "outputMode": "changes"}'

from apify_client import ApifyClient
client = ApifyClient("YOUR_API_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("dheerajitbhu/woocommerce-catalog-monitor").call(run_input={
    "storeUrls": ["https://competitor-store.com"],
    "outputMode": "changes",
})
for row in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    if row.get("recordType") == "change":
        print(row["changeType"], row["name"], row.get("permalink"))

Schedule it in Apify with a daily (or hourly) schedule and a fixed snapshot store name — each run then reports only what changed since the last one.

Integrations

This actor runs on the Apify platform, so it connects to the tools you already use without custom code:

• Make, Zapier, n8n — trigger a run on a schedule or webhook, and feed new/removed/price/stock-change rows straight into your workflow using Apify's integrations for each tool.
• Google Sheets — push each run's change rows to a spreadsheet with the Apify Google Sheets integration, so a non-technical teammate can watch prices without opening the dashboard.
• Slack / email — get notified when a scheduled run finds changes (or fails) via Apify's built-in Slack and email integrations.
• API, Python, and JavaScript clients — call it programmatically with the Apify API or the apify-client / apify-client-js libraries (see "Use it from code" above).
• MCP / AI agents — expose this actor as a callable tool to Claude, Cursor, or any MCP-compatible agent through the Apify MCP server, so an agent can schedule checks and read back changes on its own.

Run it on a schedule

Suggested frequency: daily for most competitor tracking, hourly during sales events or for fast-moving stock. You're only charged for changes, so frequent runs stay cheap.

To set it up: save your input as a Task in Apify Console, then add a Schedule. Send results where you work with Apify integrations: Google Sheets, Slack or email notifications, webhooks, Make / Zapier / n8n, or straight into an AI agent through the Apify MCP server. A run that can't get data is marked failed, so your alerts fire.

FAQ

Is this legal? Is the data public? Yes. It reads only the public catalog data the store shows any visitor — no private or password-protected pages are accessed. You're responsible for using the data in line with each store's terms.

Do I need a login or API keys? No. No account, login, or API key is required for the store you're monitoring. You only need your own Apify account to run the actor.

How often should I schedule it? Daily is a good default for most catalogs; hourly works for fast-moving sales or stock-sensitive stores. The first run for a store only records a baseline and doesn't report changes — every run after that reports (and charges for) what changed since the last run.

What does a run cost? Pay per event: $0.001 per run, $0.0002 per product checked, $0.005 per change detected. A 1,000-product store with 10 changes costs about $0.25 per run. Set Maximum charge per run to cap spend.

Does it need a proxy? No. It reads public catalog data efficiently, so no proxy is needed.

What happens if a store blocks it or can't be read? The store is reported as unsupported/failed in an error row, and it is not charged. This includes private, password-protected, and B2B-only stores.

How do I get support or report a bug? Open an issue on this actor's Issues tab on Apify (apify.com/dheerajitbhu/woocommerce-catalog-monitor/issues) and we'll follow up there.

Related actors

• WooCommerce Products Scraper — export a full WooCommerce catalog as JSON/CSV/Excel in one shot, instead of tracking changes over time.
• DriftGuard — on Shopify instead of WooCommerce? Catch feed-vs-storefront price and availability drift before Google/Meta/TikTok disapprove your products.
• AliExpress Scraper — track supplier prices on AliExpress alongside competitor stores.
• Shopify Scraper — competitors on Shopify? Export their products and prices too.

Built and maintained by Integration Yard (dheerajitbhu).

Independent tool. Not affiliated with or endorsed by WooCommerce / Automattic. Use monitored data in line with each store's terms.