Legacy Obituaries Extractor

Search Legacy.com for obituaries and death notices by name and get the results back as clean, structured data. Type a person's name, run the actor, and collect every matching record ready for a spreadsheet, database, or your own application.

Legacy.com is one of the largest obituary networks online, carrying death notices from thousands of local newspapers and funeral homes across the United States and beyond. This actor turns that search into an export you can actually work with.

What it does

Give the actor one name or a list of names. For each name it searches the Legacy.com obituary index, pages through the matches, and returns a structured record for every person it finds, including:

• The person's full name, and first and last name
• Age at death, plus birth and death dates
• The biography or death notice summary text
• The funeral home or newspaper that published the notice, with a link
• The city and country associated with the person
• A photo when one is available
• A direct link to the full obituary page on Legacy.com

You control how many records come back with a single limit, and the actor stops paging as soon as it reaches that number.

Features

• Search by name. Full names, partial names, first name only, or surname only all work.
• Batch mode. Pass a list of names and process them all in one run. Results are combined into a single dataset.
• Automatic pagination. The actor walks through result pages until it hits your item limit, so you are not capped at the first page.
• Duplicate protection. The same person is never written twice, even when they appear across pages or overlapping searches.
• Clean, typed output. Every record has the same shape. Missing values come back as null rather than being dropped, so downstream parsing stays simple.
• Empty searches are handled. A name with no matches writes no rows and logs a clear message instead of returning junk.
• Export anywhere. Results download as JSON, CSV, Excel, or HTML, or pull them straight from the Apify API.

Use cases

• Genealogy and family history. Trace relatives, confirm death dates, and gather source records for a family tree.
• Memorial and tribute sites. Pull structured obituary data to seed or enrich a remembrance platform.
• Research and journalism. Verify names, ages, and dates against a public record, or study patterns across many notices.
• Funeral and cemetery services. Cross reference published notices and keep records aligned.
• Data and archival projects. Build a searchable obituary archive from a list of names.

Input

Field	Type	Required	Description
query	string	Yes*	The name to search for, for example Harry Potter.
queries	array of strings	No	Extra names to search in the same run, each looked up separately.
maxItems	integer	No	Maximum records to collect across all searches. Default 100, maximum 1000.
requestTimeoutSecs	integer	No	Per request timeout in seconds. Default 30.

* Provide a name in query, in queries, or both. At least one name is required.

Example input

{
    "query": "Harry Potter",
    "queries": ["John Smith", "Mary Johnson"],
    "maxItems": 100
}

Output

Each obituary is one item in the dataset. Fields that a listing does not include are returned as null, so every row has the same structure.

Output fields

Field	Type	Description
fullName	string	The person's full name as published.
firstName	string / null	Given name, taken from the full name when not supplied separately.
lastName	string / null	Surname, taken from the full name when not supplied separately.
age	integer / null	Age at death, when available.
birthDate	string / null	Date of birth in YYYY-MM-DD format.
deathDate	string / null	Date of death in YYYY-MM-DD format.
bio	string / null	The obituary or death notice summary text.
photo	string / null	URL of the person's photo, when one is published.
personId	string / null	Legacy.com identifier for the person.
personUrl	string / null	Direct link to the full obituary page.
funeralHome	string / null	Funeral home or newspaper that published the notice.
funeralHomeUrl	string / null	Link to the publisher's version of the notice.
publishedDate	string / null	Date the notice was first posted.
obituaryCount	integer / null	Number of notices on record for this person.
locality	string / null	City or town associated with the person.
country	string / null	Country associated with the person.
locationCount	integer / null	Number of locations linked to the person.
searchQuery	string	The name you searched that produced this record.
scrapedAt	string	UTC timestamp of when the record was collected.

Example output

{
    "fullName": "Harold David Potter",
    "firstName": "Harold",
    "lastName": "Potter",
    "age": 82,
    "birthDate": "1944-02-26",
    "deathDate": "2026-05-06",
    "bio": "Harold David Potter passed away on Wednesday, May 6, 2026. The family is being cared for by Mynatt Funeral Home, Inc. - Powell Chapel.",
    "photo": null,
    "personId": "61322071",
    "personUrl": "https://www.legacy.com/person/harold-david-potter-61322071",
    "funeralHome": "Mynatt Funeral Home, Inc. - Powell Chapel",
    "funeralHomeUrl": "https://www.mynattfh.com/obituaries/harold-potter",
    "publishedDate": "2026-05-06",
    "obituaryCount": 1,
    "locality": "Powell",
    "country": "United States",
    "locationCount": 3,
    "searchQuery": "Harry Potter",
    "scrapedAt": "2026-08-29T12:00:00+00:00"
}

How to use

On the Apify platform

1. Open the actor and go to the input tab.
2. Enter a name in the Name to search field, or add several under Additional names.
3. Set Max items if you want more or fewer than 100 records.
4. Click Start and download the dataset from the Storage tab when the run finishes.

Tips

• Common names return many matches. A name like John Smith can fill the dataset quickly. Use maxItems to keep runs focused, or search more specific full names.
• Search broad, then filter. Pull a wide set of records and filter by deathDate, locality, or funeralHome in your spreadsheet or code afterward.
• Batch related names together. Put every name you are researching in queries so a single run covers the whole list.

FAQ

Which names can I search? Any full or partial name. First name only, surname only, and full name all return matches from the index.

How many results can I get per run? Up to 1000 records, set with maxItems. The actor pages through results automatically to reach the number you ask for.

Why are some fields null? Not every notice lists an age, photo, or exact dates. When a value is not published, the field comes back as null so the record shape stays consistent.

What happens if a name has no obituaries? The actor writes no rows for that name and logs a message noting the empty search. Your dataset only ever contains real records.

In what formats can I export the data? JSON, CSV, Excel, and HTML, plus direct access through the Apify API and client libraries.

Notes and disclaimer

Records come from the public Legacy.com search index and reflect what is published there at the time of the run. Obituary content belongs to the families, funeral homes, and publishers who posted it. Use this actor responsibly and in line with Legacy.com's terms and applicable laws, and treat the data with the sensitivity the subject deserves.