# RSS Feed Reader: RSS & Atom to JSON, Find Feeds, Only New Items (`gmyri/rss-feed-reader`) Actor

Read RSS and Atom feeds as clean JSON. Auto-discovers feeds from any website, outputs only new items for scheduled monitoring, filters by date and keyword. $0.50 per 1,000 items.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/gmyri/rss-feed-reader.md
- **Developed by:** [Giorgos Myrianthous](https://apify.com/gmyri) (community)
- **Categories:** News, Automation, Developer tools
- **Security:** Limited permissions
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

from $0.50 / 1,000 feed items

This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events.

Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/actors/running/actors-in-store.md#pay-per-event

## What's an Apify Actor?

An Actor is a serverless cloud program that runs on the Apify platform. It has two run modes.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.

Apify vocabulary and the platform model are defined once, in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md.

## How to integrate an Actor?

If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.

Do not guess an integration path. Every one of them is in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md: the Apify MCP server, Agent Skills with the Apify CLI, the JavaScript and Python clients, the REST API, and the account-free path for an agent with no human to sign in. It also carries the rule on stating cost before the first paid run.

For examples already wired to this Actor's own input schema, see the [API](#api) section below.

Each client library has reference documentation the quickstart does not restate: [JavaScript/TypeScript](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md) (`npm install apify-client`) and [Python](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md) (`pip install apify-client`).

# README

## RSS Feed Reader: RSS & Atom to JSON, Find Feeds, Only New Items

Turn any **RSS or Atom feed into clean JSON**: titles, links, ISO dates, plain-text summaries, categories, images and podcast enclosures. Give it a website and it **finds the feed**. Turn on **only new items** and scheduled runs return just the fresh posts, ready for Slack alerts, newsletters, Google Sheets or AI agents.

💲 **$0.50 per 1,000 feed items.** Discovery, failed feeds and filtered or already-seen items are free. Pay only for results. No subscription, and the Apify free plan's monthly credit covers small jobs.

**Also known as:** RSS to JSON, RSS parser, Atom parser, RSS feed scraper, feed finder, news monitor, blog monitoring, RSS to Slack/Sheets, podcast feed parser, new post alerts.

### Try it now (free-plan friendly)

1. Click **Start**. The prefilled input works as is. Reads 10 items each from Hacker News and The Verge (feed found automatically) in about 5 seconds.
2. Or paste this input into the JSON tab:

```json
{
  "feeds": [
    "https://hnrss.org/frontpage",
    "https://www.theverge.com"
  ],
  "maxItemsPerFeed": 10
}
```

**Example output** (one dataset item, shortened):

```json
{
  "feedUrl": "https://hnrss.org/frontpage",
  "feedTitle": "Hacker News: Front Page",
  "title": "16colo.rs – ANSI/ASCII art archive",
  "link": "https://16colo.rs/",
  "published": "2026-10-29T16:14:28+00:00",
  "summary": "Article URL: https://16colo.rs/ ...",
  "categories": [],
  "imageUrl": null
}
```

Small runs cost cents, and you can set a **Max cost per run** so you're never charged more.

### Use with AI agents / Apify MCP

Give your agent (Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, n8n AI Agent, LangChain, OpenAI Agents SDK) this tool through **Apify's MCP server**:

```text
https://mcp.apify.com?tools=gmyri/rss-feed-reader
```

- **Example prompt:** "Get the latest 10 posts from the Hacker News front page feed."
- **Why agents like it:** the input has one required field and documented defaults and enums. The output has stable, flat field names, errors are returned as items with an `error` field and are never charged, and each run writes a summary to the `OUTPUT` record.
- Agents that use `search-actors` find it by searching for: RSS to JSON, RSS parser.

### API, Python, n8n, Make, Zapier

```bash
curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/gmyri~rss-feed-reader/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{"feeds":["https://hnrss.org/frontpage"],"onlyNewItems":true,"stateStoreName":"hn-monitor"}'
```

- **Python:** `ApifyClient(token).actor("gmyri/rss-feed-reader").call(run_input={...})`
- **n8n / Make / Zapier:** use the Apify "Run Actor" action with `gmyri/rss-feed-reader`, then read the dataset items.

### Quick FAQ

- **How does 'only new items' work?** Item IDs are stored in a named key-value store in your account. Use a different `stateStoreName` for each independent monitor.
- **Can I give it a homepage instead of a feed URL?** Yes. It looks for `<link rel=alternate>` tags, then common paths such as /feed and /rss.xml.
- **How do I get alerts?** Schedule the Actor (for example hourly) with onlyNewItems on, then add a Slack, email or webhook integration on run success.
- **What if I set a spending limit?** The Actor stops cleanly at your *Max cost per run* and you're never charged above it.

### Details

### What it does

- Reads **RSS 2.0, RSS 1.0/RDF and Atom** feeds and returns clean JSON: title, link, published date (ISO, UTC), plain-text summary, categories, image and enclosures (podcast audio).
- **Finds the feed for you:** give it a website or blog URL and it discovers the feed from `<link rel="alternate">` or common paths (`/feed`, `/rss.xml`, `/atom.xml`, `/index.xml`…).
- **Only new items:** remembers what it already returned (in a named key-value store) so scheduled runs output only fresh posts. Ideal for Slack/email alerts, newsletters and AI agents.
- **Filters:** `publishedSince` (`2026-10-01` or `24 hours`, `3 days`, `2 weeks`) and keyword filters.
- **Full content:** optional `contentText` with the article text when the feed includes it.

### Typical uses

- News, blog and competitor monitoring on an Apify schedule, piped to Slack, email, Google Sheets or a webhook.
- Feeding fresh articles to an LLM or RAG pipeline.
- Podcast episode tracking (enclosures).
- Turning many feeds into one combined, filtered dataset.

### Input

| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| `feeds` | Feed URLs or website URLs. |
| `maxItemsPerFeed` | Newest items per feed after filters (default 20). |
| `onlyNewItems` | Output only items not seen in previous runs. |
| `stateStoreName` | Named store for the "seen" state. Use one name per monitor. |
| `publishedSince` | ISO date or relative period. |
| `keywords` | Keep items that mention any of these words. |
| `includeContent` | Add full text (`contentText`). |

### Pricing

Pay per event: **$0.0005 per feed item ($0.50 per 1,000 items)** plus Apify's standard $0.00005 Actor start. Feed discovery, feeds that fail, and filtered or already-seen items are free.

### Notes

- Feeds are public files meant for syndication. The Actor reads only the feed and, for discovery, the page you give it. No logins and no bot-protection bypass.
- Author names are not collected.
- Each run's `OUTPUT` record lists every feed with its item count or error.

### Related tools

- [PDF to Markdown & Text Converter: Word, Excel, PPT, HTML, RAG](https://apify.com/gmyri/doc-to-markdown)
- [Merge & Deduplicate Datasets: Remove Duplicates, Only New Items](https://apify.com/gmyri/dataset-merge-dedup)
- [Website Screenshot API: Full Page, Mobile & URL to PDF](https://apify.com/gmyri/website-screenshot)
- [Website Audit All-in-One: SEO, PageSpeed, Broken Links, SSL](https://apify.com/gmyri/website-audit)

💡 **Need several checks per site?** [Website Audit All-in-One](https://apify.com/gmyri/website-audit) runs SEO, broken links, PageSpeed, tech stack and SSL/DNS checks in one report for $0.03 per site.

All tools by gmyri: [doc-to-markdown](https://apify.com/gmyri/doc-to-markdown), [dataset-merge-dedup](https://apify.com/gmyri/dataset-merge-dedup), [site-health-audit](https://apify.com/gmyri/site-health-audit), [website-screenshot](https://apify.com/gmyri/website-screenshot), [domain-health-check](https://apify.com/gmyri/domain-health-check), [image-pdf-ocr](https://apify.com/gmyri/image-pdf-ocr), [tech-stack-detector](https://apify.com/gmyri/tech-stack-detector), [pagespeed-checker](https://apify.com/gmyri/pagespeed-checker), [website-audit](https://apify.com/gmyri/website-audit).

# Actor input Schema

## `feeds` (type: `array`):

RSS/Atom feed URLs, or website/blog URLs. For websites the feed is discovered automatically (<link rel=alternate>, /feed, /rss.xml...).

## `maxItemsPerFeed` (type: `integer`):

Newest items to output per feed (after filters).

## `onlyNewItems` (type: `boolean`):

Remember item IDs in a named key-value store and output only items never seen before. Ideal for scheduled monitoring, Slack/email alerts and AI agents.

## `stateStoreName` (type: `string`):

Named key-value store used by 'Only new items'. Use different names for independent monitors.

## `publishedSince` (type: `string`):

Only items published after this date (ISO, e.g. 2026-10-01) or relative ('24 hours', '3 days', '2 weeks').

## `keywords` (type: `array`):

Only items whose title, summary or categories contain any of these words (case-insensitive).

## `includeContent` (type: `boolean`):

Add contentText with the full article text when the feed provides it (content:encoded).

## `maxSummaryChars` (type: `integer`):

Summary is converted to plain text and truncated to this length.

## `timeoutSecs` (type: `integer`):

Per-request timeout.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "feeds": [
    "https://hnrss.org/frontpage",
    "https://www.theverge.com"
  ],
  "maxItemsPerFeed": 10,
  "onlyNewItems": false,
  "stateStoreName": "rss-feed-reader-state",
  "includeContent": false,
  "maxSummaryChars": 1000,
  "timeoutSecs": 20
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `results` (type: `string`):

One item per feed entry (newest first).

## `summary` (type: `string`):

Totals and per-input report.

# API

You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.

## JavaScript example

```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
    token: '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>',
});

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {
    "feeds": [
        "https://hnrss.org/frontpage",
        "https://www.theverge.com"
    ],
    "maxItemsPerFeed": 10
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("gmyri/rss-feed-reader").call(input);

// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.dir(item);
});

// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs

```

## Python example

```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient

# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_API_TOKEN>")

# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = {
    "feeds": [
        "https://hnrss.org/frontpage",
        "https://www.theverge.com",
    ],
    "maxItemsPerFeed": 10,
}

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("gmyri/rss-feed-reader").call(run_input=run_input)

# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print(f"💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}")
for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items():
    print(item)

# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start

```

## CLI example

```bash
echo '{
  "feeds": [
    "https://hnrss.org/frontpage",
    "https://www.theverge.com"
  ],
  "maxItemsPerFeed": 10
}' |
apify call gmyri/rss-feed-reader --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,gmyri/rss-feed-reader"
        }
    }
}
```

The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer <APIFY_API_TOKEN>` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations).

## OpenAPI specification

Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/0brBr38VXkmZTLYLI/builds/YHPCRCHQtQfJ39j7x/openapi.json