Federal Register Documents Scraper

What does Federal Register Documents Scraper do?

It reads the public FederalRegister.gov API and returns new US Federal Register documents as clean rows: rules, proposed rules, notices and presidential documents with title, action, abstract, DATES text, publication date, agencies, FR citation and pages, effective date, comment deadline, docket ids, RINs, CFR parts affected, topics, the significant flag, and links to the FederalRegister.gov page, the official PDF on govinfo.gov and the Regulations.gov comment page.

Price: $1.5 per 1,000 documents ($0.0015 per row) plus a tiny start fee. Status rows (nothing matched, API failed) are free.

Quick start

1. Run it with the prefilled input: {"daysBack": 3, "maxItems": 20}. That returns up to 20 of the newest documents, about $0.03 at $1.5 per 1,000.
2. Export the dataset as CSV, JSON or Excel, or read it through the API.
3. For a daily feed, turn on Only new since last run and add a schedule: later runs return and charge only documents you have not seen before.

Use cases

You want to...	What this actor gives you
A daily feed of new rules and notices from the agencies you track	Agency and document-type filters + schedule + Only new since last run.
Track comment deadlines, dockets or CFR parts	Comment deadline, docket ids, RINs and CFR parts affected per document.
Federal Register metadata in a spreadsheet or database	JSON, CSV, Excel or API output with FR citation and links to the official PDF.
Feed an AI agent or compliance workflow	One clean row per document with abstract, action and dates.

Only new since last run

Turn on Only new since last run and schedule the tool. Each run returns (and charges) only documents it has not returned to you before. The memory is a key-value store named federal-register-documents-state in your own Apify account. Use Only-new memory name to keep a separate memory per saved search. The first run returns everything that matches (up to Max documents).

Input

• Days back: documents published in the last N days, today included (default 3).
• Start date / End date: optional fixed window (YYYY-MM-DD).
• Keyword: optional full-text search.
• Document types: any of RULE, PRORULE, NOTICE, PRESDOCU. Empty = all.
• Agencies (slugs): e.g. environmental-protection-agency, food-and-drug-administration (the slug is the last part of an agency page address on FederalRegister.gov).
• Only significant rules, Docket id: optional filters.
• Max documents: caps the run and your cost. Newest documents come first.

Example:

{"daysBack": 1, "documentTypes": ["RULE", "PRORULE"], "agencies": ["environmental-protection-agency"], "onlyNew": true, "maxItems": 100}

Output (one row per document)

{"rowType": "document", "documentNumber": "2026-22269", "type": "Rule", "action": "Temporary final rule.",
 "title": "Safety Zone; M/T KALAHARI, Gulf of America, Pascagoula, MS",
 "publicationDate": "2026-10-30", "agencies": ["Homeland Security Department", "Coast Guard"],
 "citation": "91 FR 68478", "effectiveOn": "2026-10-30", "docketIds": ["Docket Number USCG-2026-0467"],
 "regulationIdNumbers": ["1625-AA00"], "cfrReferences": ["33 CFR 165"], "significant": false,
 "htmlUrl": "https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/10/30/2026-22269/safety-zone-mt-kalahari-gulf-of-america-pascagoula-ms",
 "pdfUrl": "https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2026-10-30/pdf/2026-22269.pdf", "status": "ok"}

(Shortened. Example values from the FederalRegister.gov API on 2026-10-31; live values change. Full field list in the Output tab.)

Download as JSON, CSV, Excel or via the Apify API.

What it does not collect

Document metadata only, no full text. E-mail addresses and phone-like numbers inside text fields are replaced. Agency contact persons (in the document body) are not collected.

How it works

• Uses only the public FederalRegister.gov API (no key), as the site asks for programmatic access. It never loads the website's HTML pages.
• Reads robots.txt first and obeys it; one request at a time with at least 1.5 seconds between requests; no login, no cookies; redirects are not followed.
• Up to 100 documents per request. The prefilled run (3 days, 20 documents) is 2 requests.

Limitations

• Not the official edition. FederalRegister.gov is an unofficial rendition and does not provide legal notice. Each row links the official PDF on govinfo.gov (pdfUrl); verify there for legal work.
• The API pages only the first 2,000 results of a search. Larger windows get a free truncated row; split the dates.
• Some documents have empty abstract, dates, docket or CFR fields; empty fields are left empty, never guessed.
• commentsOpen compares the deadline with the run date (UTC) only; check the document for time of day and extensions.
• Only new mode remembers document numbers. A correction is a new document and is returned.
• From shared cloud IPs the site can occasionally show its bot check; the tool then returns a free challenged row. Retry later.
• Not affiliated with or endorsed by the Office of the Federal Register, NARA or GPO.

Changelog

• 2026-10-31: first release.

AI-operated: this tool is built and maintained by an AI-run small business.