Kijiji.ca Scraper

Extract classified listings from Kijiji.ca — Canada's #1 classifieds site (Adevinta Group) — with a vertical-aware structured schema. Most Kijiji scrapers flatten everything into one generic table; this one understands that Autos, Real Estate, Jobs, Services and Marketplace each need their own fields.

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What Makes This Different

The Kijiji scraper market is crowded but shallow — 12+ actors that all do "search URL → flat listing." This one differentiates with:

• Vertical-aware schema — Autos get make/model/year/mileageKm/VIN/CARFAX, Real Estate gets bedrooms/rent/utilitiesIncluded/amenities, Jobs get salaryMin/Max/jobType, etc.
• FSBO vs Dealer detection — derives adSource (fsbo / dealer / professional / ebay) from the image CDN path, so flippers and dealer-monitors get the split they need
• Bilingual EN/FR handling — detects descriptionLang via French hint-word density (Quebec listings are French)
• Paid placement tiers — flags isTopAd / isShowcase / isHighlighted (a seller-seriousness signal)
• Kijiji price grammar — parses Please Contact, Free, Swap/Trade, $X OBO, $X firm into structured priceType + isNegotiable

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How It Works

Kijiji.ca is a React/Next.js SPA. Listing data is hydrated into the page as JSON. This actor:

1. Fetches the search/category result page HTML
2. Extracts the hydration JSON (__NEXT_DATA__, Apollo state, or JSON-LD — tolerant)
3. Deep-searches that JSON for listing arrays
4. Parses each listing with the vertical-aware schema
5. Optionally visits each listing's detail page (VIP) for full data
6. Follows pagination

No browser, no headless Chrome — pure HTTP.

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Input

Search URLs mode (recommended)

Search on Kijiji.ca, copy the result page URL, paste it in:

{
  "mode": "search-urls",
  "searchUrls": [
    "https://www.kijiji.ca/b-cars-trucks/gta-greater-toronto-area/c174l1700272",
    "https://www.kijiji.ca/b-apartments-condos/city-of-toronto/c37l1700273"
  ],
  "fetchDetails": true,
  "maxItems": 100
}

Keyword search mode

{
  "mode": "keyword-search",
  "keyword": "toyota camry",
  "categoryCode": "c174",
  "provinces": ["ON", "QC"],
  "maxItems": 100
}

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
mode	string	search-urls	search-urls or keyword-search
searchUrls	array	[]	Kijiji result page URLs (search-urls mode)
vertical	string	auto	auto / marketplace / autos / real-estate / jobs / services
keyword	string	""	Free-text search (keyword-search mode)
categoryCode	string	""	Category code e.g. c174, c37, c10 (keyword-search mode)
provinces	array	["ON"]	Province codes (keyword-search mode)
minPrice / maxPrice	integer	0	CAD price filter
sortBy	string	dateDesc	relevance / dateDesc / priceAsc / priceDesc
adSourceFilter	string	all	all / fsbo-only / dealer-only / exclude-ebay
language	string	both	both / en / fr
fetchDetails	boolean	true	Visit each VIP page for full data (slower, richer)
maxItems	integer	100	Total listing cap (0 = unlimited)
maxPages	integer	10	Pages per search URL
requestDelay	integer (ms)	500	Delay between requests
maxConcurrency	integer	3	Parallel requests
maxRetries	integer	3	Retries on 403/503/429
proxyConfiguration	object	CA residential	Proxy settings
debugMode	boolean	false	Verbose parser logging (hydration structure, listing keys, attribute dumps) for the first page of each search — for troubleshooting

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Category Codes

Codes verified against live Kijiji. The actor also auto-detects the vertical from the search-URL slug, so an exact code match isn't required.

Code	Category	Vertical
c174	Cars & Trucks	autos
c30	Motorcycles	autos
c27	Cars & Vehicles (parent)	autos
c37	Apartments & Condos	real-estate
c34	Real Estate (parent)	real-estate
c10	Buy & Sell	marketplace
c45	Jobs	jobs
c72	Services	services

Tip: the simplest path is to browse Kijiji.ca to the category/city you want and paste the result-page URL into searchUrls — the vertical is inferred automatically.

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Provinces

Code	Province	Code	Province
ON	Ontario	MB	Manitoba
QC	Quebec	SK	Saskatchewan
BC	British Columbia	NS	Nova Scotia
AB	Alberta	NB	New Brunswick
NL	Newfoundland	PE	Prince Edward Island

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Output

Common fields appear on every record; vertical-specific fields are populated based on the listing's vertical.

Autos listing example

{
  "listingId": "1733059633",
  "vertical": "autos",
  "categoryCode": "c174",
  "title": "2023 Ford Edge SEL No Accident Leather Radar Cruise Navigation",
  "url": "https://www.kijiji.ca/v-cars-trucks/mississauga-peel-region/2023-ford-edge.../1733059633",
  "descriptionLang": "en",
  "priceAmount": 23995,
  "priceCurrency": "CAD",
  "priceType": "fixed",
  "locationCity": "Mississauga",
  "locationProvince": "ON",
  "latitude": 43.6449207,
  "longitude": -79.6509123,
  "adSource": "dealer",
  "posterId": "COMMERCIAL_7108",
  "make": "ford",
  "model": "edge",
  "trim": "SEL",
  "year": 2023,
  "mileageKm": 76402,
  "transmission": "Automatic",
  "fuelType": "Gasoline",
  "drivetrain": "AWD",
  "bodyType": "SUV / Crossover",
  "color": "white",
  "condition": "used",
  "vin": "2FMPK4J95PBA28054",
  "forSaleBy": "Dealer",
  "features": ["Bluetooth", "Alloy Wheels"],
  "imageCount": 25,
  "isTopAd": true,
  "priceDropped": null,
  "scrapedAt": "2026-05-14T12:49:00Z"
}

make / model come straight from Kijiji's attribute data and are lower-cased (ford, edge); the human-readable name is in title. Some Kijiji model values are internal slugs (e.g. crv, slvrd1500).

Real estate listing example

{
  "listingId": "1735361401",
  "vertical": "real-estate",
  "categoryCode": "c37",
  "title": "Modern, Newly Renovated 1 Bed+Den on the Danforth",
  "priceAmount": 2300,
  "priceType": "fixed",
  "locationCity": "Toronto",
  "locationProvince": "ON",
  "latitude": 43.67986,
  "longitude": -79.3389,
  "adSource": "fsbo",
  "listingType": "For Rent",
  "propertyType": "apartment",
  "bedrooms": "1.5",
  "bathrooms": "1",
  "rentMonthly": 2300,
  "utilitiesIncluded": ["Heat", "Water"],
  "furnished": "No",
  "petsAllowed": "No",
  "sizeText": "520 sq ft",
  "availableDate": "2026-06-01T00:00:00Z",
  "agreementType": "one-year",
  "buildingAmenities": ["Laundry (In-Unit)", "Air Conditioning"]
}

Kijiji codes bathrooms as count×10 — the parser decodes "10" → "1", "15" → "1.5". furnished / petsAllowed are decoded to Yes / No / Limited. utilitiesIncluded and buildingAmenities are collected from Kijiji's separate boolean attributes.

Notes

• adSource is derived from the image CDN path (ca-prod-fsbo-ads → fsbo) with a poster-type fallback
• descriptionLang is auto-detected; Quebec listings are usually fr
• priceType: fixed / contact (Please Contact) / free / swap
• isRepost, priceDropped, underpricedFlag, categoryMedian require cross-run state and are reserved for a future version (currently null)
• motivatedSeller is detected from urgency keywords in the title/description

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Use Cases

• Auto dealers & used-car pricing — Kijiji Autos benchmark, FSBO sourcing, VIN + mileage + trim valuation input
• Resellers & flippers — FSBO filter + motivated-seller signal + price tracking pipeline
• Real estate investors & property managers — rental price trends, utilities-included analysis, competitor pricing (CAPREIT, Minto, Boardwalk)
• Retail arbitrage & pricing intelligence — second-hand price vs retail, demand proxy by listing volume
• Local recruitment analysis — Kijiji Jobs blue-collar/local segment that Indeed/SEEK miss
• Academic & policy research — Statistics Canada, Bank of Canada, CMHC: second-hand economy, housing affordability
• Fraud & trust/safety — abnormal pricing, repost patterns, "cash only" risk signals
• Quebec/bilingual market specialists — French content detection and normalization

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Cost & Performance

• No browser — pure HTTP, low CU consumption
• fetchDetails: true roughly doubles requests (1 search page + 1 VIP per listing) but yields full data
• Set fetchDetails: false for fast, summary-only scrapes
• Canadian residential proxy strongly recommended for sustained runs

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Limitations

• Field discovery: Kijiji's internal __NEXT_DATA__ field names can change; the parser is tolerant (tries many field names + deep-search fallback) but a Kijiji frontend rewrite may need a parser update.
• Kijiji Autos platform (autos.kijiji.ca) is a separate frontend; this actor scrapes the classic Kijiji /b-cars-trucks/ autos which are cross-linked.
• Intelligence fields (repost / price-drop / underpriced detection) need persistent cross-run state — reserved for a future release.
• Anti-bot: moderate. Datacenter IPs work partially; residential CA proxy is the reliable path.

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Changelog

Version	Date	Notes
1.0.0	2026-05-14	Initial release — vertical-aware schema across all 5 verticals (Autos, Real Estate, Jobs, Services, Marketplace), calibrated against live Kijiji. Apollo-state hydration parsing with __ref denormalization, FSBO/dealer detection from image CDN, bilingual EN/FR detection, Kijiji price-grammar parsing, enum decoding (transmission/fuel/bodytype/bathrooms/furnished/pets), search-urls + keyword modes, optional VIP detail enrichment, debugMode for troubleshooting.