Open Library Books Search

Open Library books scraper returns book and edition metadata for searches, ISBNs, and Open Library identifiers. Open Library books API results include titles, authors, publication details, covers, and source links when available.

Input example

{
  "isbns": [
    "9780261103344"
  ],
  "maxItems": 20
}

The input keys and allowed values follow .actor/input_schema.json.

Output fields

Field	Type	Example or excerpt from sample
status	string	"ok"
title	string	"The Hobbit"
subtitle	string or null	"or There and Back Again"
workId	string	"OL27482W"
editionId	string or null	"OL10236414M"
openLibraryUrl	string	"https://openlibrary.org/books/OL10236414M"
authorNames	array	["J.R.R. Tolkien"]
authorIds	array	["OL26320A"]
authors	array	[{"authorId": "OL26320A", "name": "J.R.R. Tolkien", "url": "https://openlibrary.org/a…
firstPublishYear	integer or null	1965
firstPublishDate	string or null	"January 1938"
publishDate	string or null	"2011"
description	string	"Bilbo Baggins is a hobbit who enjoys a comfortable, unambitious life, rarely travell…
subjects	array	["Fantasy"]
languages	array	["eng"]
publishers	array	["HarperCollins Publishers"]
isbn10	array	["0261103342"]
isbn13	array	["9780261103344"]
editionCount	integer	482
numberOfPages	integer or null	96
editions	array	[{"editionId": "OL62623719M", "workId": "OL27482W", "title": "Hobit ali Tja in spet n…
editionsTruncated	boolean	true
errors	array	[]
coverId	integer	10522108
coverUrl	string	"https://covers.openlibrary.org/b/id/10522108-L.jpg?default=false"
coverUrls	object	{"S": "https://covers.openlibrary.org/b/id/10522108-S.jpg?default=false", "M": "https…
source	string	"isbn"
input	string	"9780261103344"
sourceUrls	array	["https://openlibrary.org/isbn/9780261103344.json", "https://openlibrary.org/works/OL…
retrievedAt	string	"2026-10-05T14:57:43.535747+00:00"

Output example

Trimmed from sample_output.json; omitted fields remain available in the dataset.

{
  "status": "ok",
  "title": "The Hobbit",
  "subtitle": "or There and Back Again",
  "workId": "OL27482W",
  "editionId": "OL10236414M",
  "openLibraryUrl": "https://openlibrary.org/books/OL10236414M",
  "authorNames": [
    "J.R.R. Tolkien"
  ]
}

Limits and source behavior

• The actor uses official Open Library APIs for search, works, editions, ISBN resolution and authors. It retrieves metadata, not book files or reader accounts.
• Starts of API requests are globally spaced at least 1.05 seconds apart, including retries. Timeout, malformed JSON, rate-limit and server failures receive up to three retries after the initial attempt, with exponential delay and bounded Retry-After handling. Permanent missing resources become error rows.
• Optional author, work or edition enrichment failures leave the resolved book usable and record the failure in errors. Missing optional fields remain empty.
• Cover URLs use the Covers API's documented format with default=false; a missing image returns 404. Image URLs are not downloaded or checked by this actor. Cover availability and usage rights depend on the source.
• Search is paginated until the output cap or source exhaustion. Editions are a sample in the API's order; editionsTruncated indicates omissions. The catalog is community maintained, so titles, dates, ISBN associations and descriptions can be incomplete or inconsistent.
• Use modest result caps for API queries. Open Library recommends data dumps for bulk collection; this actor is not a whole-catalog export tool.

FAQ

What are the output limits? maxItems caps records and errors; optional authors and editions may be incomplete when source requests fail.

Do I need a proxy or login? Public Open Library endpoints need no login or proxy.

How is this priced? Proposed pay per event: $0.001 for each resolved, deduplicated book row. Error rows and suppressed duplicates are uncharged. These are proposals in PRICING.md; the owner must configure Store billing.

How are rate limits handled? The client limits concurrent requests with concurrency and retries transient responses with backoff and Retry-After.

How fresh is the data? Open Library records are community maintained and can be incomplete or change. retrievedAt shows collection time; original source URLs remain in each row.

Use with AI agents / MCP

After the actor is published, connect your agent to the Apify MCP server with an Apify API token. Use call-actor with the published actor identifier and the JSON input shown above. Read the returned dataset with get-dataset-items; the run response itself contains status and storage IDs, not the result rows. Alternatively, use the Apify API to start a run and read its default dataset. Keep the actor input bounded with maxItems, and inspect source links and any error fields before using results in an answer.