Substack Publications Scraper 📚

Extract comprehensive publication data from Substack's search results. This actor helps you gather detailed information about newsletters, authors, and their performance metrics.

🔍 Features

• Search publications by keywords
• Extract detailed publication metadata
• Get subscriber counts and engagement metrics
• Collect author information and social links
• Retrieve publication themes and settings
• Export data in structured JSON format

📊 Output Data

The actor provides rich publication data including:

• Publication name and description
• Author details (name, bio, photo URL)
• Subscriber counts and rankings
• Creation dates and publication status
• Theme settings and customization
• Social media integrations
• Community and podcast features
• Multilingual ranking details

💡 Use Cases

• Newsletter market research
• Content creator analysis
• Competitive intelligence
• Publishing industry insights
• Audience size tracking
• Content platform analysis

🛠️ Input Parameters

• keywords: Array of search terms to find publications
• maxItems: Maximum number of publications to scrape (default: 50)

📋 Output Format

Results are stored in JSON format with detailed publication information. Each record includes:

• Basic publication details
• Author information
• Subscriber metrics
• Theme configuration
• Platform settings
• Temporal data

💪 Benefits

• Clean, structured data
• Real-time information
• Comprehensive publication details
• Efficient bulk scraping
• Regular updates
• Reliable performance

🎯 Perfect For

• Content marketers
• Newsletter publishers
• Market researchers
• Media analysts
• Platform developers
• Digital strategists

Need to scrape specific Substack publications? Just provide your keywords and let the actor do the heavy lifting! 🚀

Input Example

A full explanation of an input example in JSON.

{
    "keywords": [
        "sale"
    ],
    "maxItems": 50
}

Output sample

The results will be wrapped into a dataset which you can always find in the Storage tab. Here's an excerpt from the data you'd get if you apply the input parameters above:

And here is the same data but in JSON. You can choose in which format to download your data: JSON, JSONL, Excel spreadsheet, HTML table, CSV, or XML.

[
    {
        "keyword": "sale",
        "apple_pay_disabled": false,
        "apex_domain": null,
        "author_id": 116594,
        "byline_images_enabled": true,
        "bylines_enabled": true,
        "chartable_token": null,
        "community_enabled": true,
        "copyright": "Anna Sale",
        "cover_photo_url": "https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/6f6ae257-6ab9-4a79-a055-0691548aaf26_1280x956.png",
        "created_at": "2023-11-07T19:46:21.152Z",
        "custom_domain_optional": false,
        "custom_domain": null,
        "custom_publication_theme_id": null,
        "default_comment_sort": "best_first",
        "default_coupon": null,
        "default_group_coupon": null,
        "default_show_guest_bios": true,
        "email_banner_url": null,
        "email_from_name": "Anna Sale",
        "email_from": null,
        "embed_tracking_disabled": false,
        "explicit": false,
        "expose_paywall_content_to_search_engines": true,
        "fb_pixel_id": null,
        "fb_site_verification_token": null,
        "flagged_as_spam": false,
        "founding_subscription_benefits": null,
        "free_subscription_benefits": null,
        "ga_pixel_id": null,
        "google_site_verification_token": null,
        "google_tag_manager_token": null,
        "hero_image": null,
        "hero_text": "Writings, recommendations, conversations and FUN from Anna Sale, host of Slate's podcast Death, Sex & Money. We're all coming from somewhere. ",
        "hide_intro_subtitle": null,
        "hide_intro_title": true,
        "hide_podcast_feed_link": false,
        "homepage_type": "magaziney",
        "id": 2088549,
        "image_thumbnails_always_enabled": false,
        "invite_only": false,
        "language": "en",
        "logo_url_wide": null,
        "logo_url": "https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93d021a9-5b75-45e2-8609-7172d8c615fa_1280x1280.png",
        "minimum_group_size": 2,
        "moderation_enabled": true,
        "name": "From Somewhere with Anna Sale",
        "paid_subscription_benefits": null,
        "parsely_pixel_id": null,
        "payments_state": "disabled",
        "paywall_free_trial_enabled": false,
        "podcast_art_url": null,
        "paid_podcast_episode_art_url": null,
        "podcast_byline": null,
        "podcast_description": null,
        "podcast_enabled": false,
        "podcast_feed_url": null,
        "podcast_title": null,
        "post_preview_limit": null,
        "require_clickthrough": false,
        "rss_feed_url": null,
        "rss_website_url": null,
        "show_pub_podcast_tab": false,
        "show_recs_on_homepage": true,
        "subdomain": "annasale",
        "subscriber_invites": 0,
        "support_email": null,
        "theme_var_background_pop": "#6B26FF",
        "theme_var_color_links": false,
        "theme_var_cover_bg_color": null,
        "trial_end_override": null,
        "twitter_pixel_id": null,
        "type": "newsletter",
        "post_reaction_faces_enabled": true,
        "is_personal_mode": false,
        "plans": null,
        "stripe_user_id": null,
        "stripe_country": null,
        "stripe_publishable_key": null,
        "stripe_platform_account": null,
        "automatic_tax_enabled": null,
        "author_name": "Anna Sale",
        "author_handle": "annasale",
        "author_photo_url": "https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb8a58b1a-c631-4a96-af98-a03ba50a7778_1027x1306.jpeg",
        "author_bio": "I'm an interviewer and writer. My podcast is Death, Sex & Money from Slate. My book is Let's Talk About Hard Things. ",
        "twitter_share_on_publish_opt_in": null,
        "has_custom_tos": false,
        "has_custom_privacy": false,
        "theme": {
            "background_pop_color": "#16a34a",
            "web_bg_color": "#ffffff",
            "cover_bg_color": null,
            "publication_id": 2088549,
            "color_links": null,
            "font_preset_heading": null,
            "font_preset_body": null,
            "font_family_headings": null,
            "font_family_body": null,
            "font_family_ui": null,
            "font_size_body_desktop": null,
            "print_secondary": null,
            "custom_css_web": null,
            "custom_css_email": null,
            "home_hero": "magaziney",
            "home_posts": "grid",
            "home_show_top_posts": false,
            "hide_images_from_list": false,
            "home_hero_alignment": "left",
            "home_hero_show_podcast_links": true,
            "default_post_header_variant": null
        },
        "threads_v2_settings": null,
        "default_group_coupon_percent_off": null,
        "pause_return_date": null,
        "has_posts": true,
        "has_recommendations": true,
        "first_post_date": "2023-12-28T15:19:46.188Z",
        "has_podcast": false,
        "has_free_podcast": false,
        "has_subscriber_only_podcast": false,
        "has_community_content": true,
        "twitter_permissions": "none",
        "rankingDetail": "Launched a year ago",
        "rankingDetailFreeIncluded": "Thousands of subscribers",
        "rankingDetailOrderOfMagnitude": 0,
        "rankingDetailFreeIncludedOrderOfMagnitude": 1000,
        "rankingDetailFreeSubscriberCount": "Over 8,000 subscribers",
        "rankingDetailByLanguage": {
            "de": {
                "rankingDetail": "Vor vor einem Jahr gelauncht",
                "rankingDetailFreeIncluded": "Tausende von Abonnenten",
                "rankingDetailOrderOfMagnitude": 0,
                "rankingDetailFreeIncludedOrderOfMagnitude": 1000,
                "rankingDetailFreeSubscriberCount": "Über 8,000 Abonnenten",
                "freeSubscriberCount": "8,000",
                "freeSubscriberCountOrderOfMagnitude": "8.2K+"
            },
            "es": {
                "rankingDetail": "Lanzado hace un año",
                "rankingDetailFreeIncluded": "Miles de suscriptores",
                "rankingDetailOrderOfMagnitude": 0,
                "rankingDetailFreeIncludedOrderOfMagnitude": 1000,
                "rankingDetailFreeSubscriberCount": "Más de 8,000 suscriptores",
                "freeSubscriberCount": "8,000",
                "freeSubscriberCountOrderOfMagnitude": "8.2K+"
            },
            "fr": {
                "rankingDetail": "Lancé il y a une année",
                "rankingDetailFreeIncluded": "Des milliers d'abonnés",
                "rankingDetailOrderOfMagnitude": 0,
                "rankingDetailFreeIncludedOrderOfMagnitude": 1000,
                "rankingDetailFreeSubscriberCount": "Plus de 8,000 abonnés",
                "freeSubscriberCount": "8,000",
                "freeSubscriberCountOrderOfMagnitude": "8.2K+"
            },
            "pt": {
                "rankingDetail": "Lançado 1 ano",
                "rankingDetailFreeIncluded": "Milhares de subscritores",
                "rankingDetailOrderOfMagnitude": 0,
                "rankingDetailFreeIncludedOrderOfMagnitude": 1000,
                "rankingDetailFreeSubscriberCount": "Mais de 8,000 subscritores",
                "freeSubscriberCount": "8,000",
                "freeSubscriberCountOrderOfMagnitude": "8.2K+"
            },
            "pt-br": {
                "rankingDetail": "Lançado 1 ano",
                "rankingDetailFreeIncluded": "Milhares de assinantes",
                "rankingDetailOrderOfMagnitude": 0,
                "rankingDetailFreeIncludedOrderOfMagnitude": 1000,
                "rankingDetailFreeSubscriberCount": "Mais de 8,000 assinantes",
                "freeSubscriberCount": "8,000",
                "freeSubscriberCountOrderOfMagnitude": "8.2K+"
            },
            "it": {
                "rankingDetail": "Lanciato 1 anno",
                "rankingDetailFreeIncluded": "Migliaia di abbonati",
                "rankingDetailOrderOfMagnitude": 0,
                "rankingDetailFreeIncludedOrderOfMagnitude": 1000,
                "rankingDetailFreeSubscriberCount": "Oltre 8,000 abbonati",
                "freeSubscriberCount": "8,000",
                "freeSubscriberCountOrderOfMagnitude": "8.2K+"
            },
            "en": {
                "rankingDetail": "Launched a year ago",
                "rankingDetailFreeIncluded": "Thousands of subscribers",
                "rankingDetailOrderOfMagnitude": 0,
                "rankingDetailFreeIncludedOrderOfMagnitude": 1000,
                "rankingDetailFreeSubscriberCount": "Over 8,000 subscribers",
                "freeSubscriberCount": "8,000",
                "freeSubscriberCountOrderOfMagnitude": "8.2K+"
            }
        },
        "freeSubscriberCount": "8,000",
        "freeSubscriberCountOrderOfMagnitude": "8.2K+",
        "author_bestseller_tier": 0,
        "disable_monthly_subscriptions": false,
        "disable_annual_subscriptions": false,
        "hide_post_restacks": false,
        "notes_feed_enabled": false,
        "last_chat_post_at": null,
        "no_follow": false,
        "paywall_chat": "free",
        "sections": [],
        "multipub_migration": null,
        "navigationBarItems": [],
        "contributors": [
            {
                "name": "Anna Sale",
                "handle": "annasale",
                "role": "admin",
                "owner": true,
                "user_id": 116594,
                "photo_url": "https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/b8a58b1a-c631-4a96-af98-a03ba50a7778_1027x1306.jpeg",
                "bio": "I'm an interviewer and writer. My podcast is Death, Sex & Money from Slate. My book is Let's Talk About Hard Things. "
            }
        ],
        "threads_v2_enabled": false,
        "viralGiftsConfig": null,
        "tier": 2,
        "no_index": false,
        "can_set_google_site_verification": true,
        "can_have_sitemap": true,
        "founding_plan_name_english": "Founding Member",
        "draft_plans": null,
        "base_url": "https://annasale.substack.com",
        "hostname": "annasale.substack.com",
        "is_on_substack": false,
        "spotify_podcast_settings": null,
        "podcastPalette": {
            "DarkMuted": {
                "population": 72,
                "rgb": [
                    73,
                    153,
                    137
                ]
            },
            "DarkVibrant": {
                "population": 6013,
                "rgb": [
                    4,
                    100,
                    84
                ]
            },
            "LightMuted": {
                "population": 7,
                "rgb": [
                    142,
                    198,
                    186
                ]
            },
            "LightVibrant": {
                "population": 3,
                "rgb": [
                    166,
                    214,
                    206
                ]
            },
            "Muted": {
                "population": 6,
                "rgb": [
                    92,
                    164,
                    156
                ]
            },
            "Vibrant": {
                "population": 5,
                "rgb": [
                    76,
                    164,
                    146
                ]
            }
        },
        "pageThemes": {
            "podcast": null
        },
        "multiple_pins": true,
        "live_subscriber_counts": false,
        "scrapedAt": "2025-02-10T05:37:31.758Z"
    },
    ...
]

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