Mastodon Scraper

Mastodon scraper for hashtag timelines, account profiles and search on any instance, with no login and no API key. Pull the latest Mastodon posts for any hashtag, an account's profile plus its recent posts, or search accounts and hashtags on mastodon.social, fosstodon.org, mstdn.jp, hachyderm.io and others. It uses the instance's public JSON API, so runs are fast and you pay per result.

What you can do with it

• Brand / topic monitoring — schedule hashtag mode for your product or industry tags, feed new posts into Slack, a sheet, or an LLM summarizer.
• Creator & competitor tracking — account mode gives follower / post counts plus the latest posts with boosts, favourites and replies per post.
• Audience research — search mode with searchType: accounts finds accounts by keyword with follower stats and profile links; searchType: hashtags returns 7-day usage history for trend scouting.
• Dataset building — hashtag timelines are federated, so one instance gives you posts from across the Fediverse. Pick local: true to restrict to one community.
• Automated feeds — Schedule it on Apify and pipe results to Google Sheets, Slack, n8n or Make via the Apify integration.
• Hashtag trend tracking — run searchType: hashtags daily and chart uses_7d / accounts_7d to see which topics are rising.

Output example

Mode hashtag / posts in mode account (type: "status"):

{
  "instance": "mastodon.social",
  "type": "status",
  "id": "117541462375141480",
  "url": "https://indieweb.social/@jbz/117541462295503480",
  "created_at": "2026-11-01T13:39:39.000Z",
  "text": "👉 Electrocutions, 'mental terror' and withheld wages: the human cost of the AI data-center boom …",
  "content_html": "<p>👉 Electrocutions, …</p>",
  "language": "en",
  "visibility": "public",
  "sensitive": false,
  "spoiler_text": null,
  "replies_count": 0,
  "reblogs_count": 4,
  "favourites_count": 7,
  "is_reblog": false,
  "reblogged_by": null,
  "in_reply_to_id": null,
  "account": "jbz@indieweb.social",
  "account_display_name": "JBZ",
  "account_url": "https://indieweb.social/@jbz",
  "account_followers": 1240,
  "account_bot": false,
  "tags": ["datacenters", "ai"],
  "mentions": [],
  "media": [{ "type": "image", "url": "https://files.mastodon.social/…/original/….jpg", "description": "Alt text" }],
  "card_url": "https://www.theguardian.com/…",
  "card_title": "Electrocutions, 'mental terror' and withheld wages…",
  "poll": null
}

Mode account first row / mode search with accounts (type: "account"):

{
  "instance": "mastodon.social",
  "type": "account",
  "id": "1",
  "acct": "Gargron",
  "username": "Gargron",
  "display_name": "Eugen Rochko",
  "url": "https://mastodon.social/@Gargron",
  "note": "Executive Strategy & Product Advisor of Mastodon …",
  "avatar": "https://files.mastodon.social/accounts/avatars/…",
  "header": "https://files.mastodon.social/accounts/headers/…",
  "followers_count": 381769,
  "following_count": 767,
  "statuses_count": 82707,
  "created_at": "2016-03-16T00:00:00.000Z",
  "last_status_at": "2026-11-01",
  "bot": false,
  "locked": false,
  "discoverable": true,
  "fields": [{ "name": "Website", "value": "zeonfederated.com", "verified_at": "2024-01-02T10:00:00.000Z" }]
}

Mode search with hashtags (type: "hashtag"):

{ "instance": "mastodon.social", "type": "hashtag", "name": "AI", "url": "https://mastodon.social/tags/ai", "uses_7d": 10263, "accounts_7d": 4177, "uses_today": 601, "following": null }

Input

Field	Description
instance	Server domain. Default mastodon.social.
mode	hashtag (default), account, search
hashtags	Mode hashtag. Tag names without #. Newest first, paginated as far as maxItems needs.
accounts	Mode account. user, @user, user@other.instance, or profile URL. Remote accounts must already be known to the chosen instance.
local	Mode hashtag. Only posts that originate on instance.
excludeReplies / excludeReblogs	Mode account. Default: replies hidden, boosts kept (is_reblog: true, original author in account).
query, searchType	Mode search. accounts (default) or hashtags. Anonymous search returns at most 40 results; full-text post search needs a logged-in user on Mastodon, so it is not offered.
maxItems	Stop after N rows total. Default 100.

Pricing

Pay per item: one event per dataset row (post, account, or hashtag). Nothing is charged for rows that are never produced.

Notes

• Hashtag timelines are public and federated. Posts set to unlisted/followers-only never appear.
• Instances rate-limit anonymous clients to 300 requests per 5 minutes; at 40 posts per request that is ~12,000 rows per 5 minutes per instance.
• Unknown account → warning in the log, no row.

FAQ

Do I need an API key or account?

No. It only uses public, anonymous endpoints. Instances rate-limit anonymous clients to 300 requests per 5 minutes (about 12,000 posts per 5 minutes per instance).

How much does it cost?

$0.002 per result and nothing else: with pay-per-event pricing you are not billed for Apify compute. 100 results cost $0.20, and the Apify free plan's $5 monthly credit covers about 2,500 results. Rows that are never produced are never charged.

How do I get the data into Google Sheets or my app?

Export the run's dataset as CSV, JSON or Excel from the Apify Console, read it from the dataset API endpoint, or connect it to Google Sheets, Slack, n8n, Make or Zapier with Apify integrations.

Is it legal to scrape Mastodon?

It only reads public data via the platform's public API and respects rate limits. You are responsible for complying with Mastodon's terms and applicable law.

Can I search the full text of Mastodon posts?

No. Mastodon only allows full-text post search for logged-in users, so this actor does not offer it. Use hashtag mode for topic tracking, or search accounts and hashtags (anonymous search returns at most 40 results).

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