CKAN Open Data Scraper - Datasets & Resources

Scrape any CKAN open-data portal in bulk. Extract dataset title, description, publishing organisation, licence, tags, resource formats and download URLs, plus created and modified dates to CSV/JSON. No API key, no login.

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What does the CKAN Scraper do?

This Actor turns CKAN data into a structured dataset. You point it at whole catalogues or filtered by topic, it walks the result pages one after another, and it writes one clean row per dataset into your dataset — ready to export as JSON, CSV or Excel, or to pull straight from the Apify API.

CKAN is the software behind most national and municipal open-data portals, and every installation exposes the same keyless package_search API. The Actor reads that endpoint, so one configuration works against data.gov.uk, the EU portal, open.canada.ca and hundreds of city portals. Resource formats and download URLs are flattened onto the dataset row, which turns the export into a working download manifest. Pagination is followed automatically until it runs out of results, hits your page limit or hits your Max items cap, whichever comes first. Every row is de-duplicated across the whole run, so you are never billed twice for the same dataset.

There is no API key, no login and no browser involved. That keeps runs fast and cheap, and it means you can schedule the Actor without worrying about credentials expiring.

Who is it for?

• Data engineers locating public datasets to ingest.
• Researchers and analysts surveying what a government publishes.
• AI teams sourcing openly licensed data with clear provenance.
• Journalists finding records for an investigation.
• Civic-tech developers building tools on public data.

Use cases

• Export every dataset a portal publishes with its download links.
• Filter to openly licensed datasets you can legally reuse.
• See which organisations publish the most, and how recently.
• Find datasets available in a specific format such as CSV or GeoJSON.
• Monitor a portal for newly added datasets on a schedule.

Why use this CKAN Scraper?

• 🔑 Keyless — no account, no API token, no cookies to paste.
• 📦 22 fields per dataset — everything the source exposes, already typed.
• 📄 Real pagination — it walks page after page instead of returning the first screen.
• 🎯 Precise caps — Max items stops the run exactly where you want it, so the bill is predictable.
• 📊 Export anywhere — JSON, CSV, Excel or HTML, plus the Apify API and integrations.
• 💸 Pay per result — you pay for rows you actually receive, with no platform fees to calculate.

What data can you extract?

Every run produces one row per dataset, with these fields:

Field	Type	Description
portalDomain	string	Domain of the CKAN portal this row came from
datasetId	string	CKAN dataset identifier
name	string	URL name of the dataset
title	string	Dataset title
datasetUrl	string	Link to the dataset page on the portal
notes	string	Dataset description with HTML stripped
organization	string	Publishing organisation name
organizationTitle	string	Publishing organisation display title
licenseId	string	Licence identifier
licenseTitle	string	Licence name
isOpen	boolean	Whether CKAN considers the licence open
tags	string	Tags, separated by a pipe
groups	string	Groups or themes, separated by a pipe
resourceCount	number	Number of downloadable resources
resourceFormats	string	Distinct resource formats, separated by a pipe
resourceUrls	string	Resource download URLs, separated by a pipe
state	string	CKAN record state, normally active
createdAt	string	ISO timestamp the metadata was created
modifiedAt	string	ISO timestamp the metadata was last modified
query	string	Search query this row came from
page	number	Result page the dataset appeared on
scrapedAt	string	ISO timestamp of extraction

Output example

{
  "portalDomain": "data.gov.uk",
  "datasetId": "e9fe97f5-bb00-44e8-a06a-8fab0ef18800",
  "name": "surface-water-flood-maps-frm-fh-surface-water-depth-m536",
  "title": "Surface Water Flood Maps (FRM_FH_SURFACE_WATER_DEPTH_M)",
  "datasetUrl": "https://data.gov.uk/dataset/surface-water-flood-maps-frm-fh-surface-water-depth-m536",
  "notes": "The following probabilities are available for surface water flooding: - High - 10 year return period - Medium - 200 year return period - Low - 200 year return period plus climate\u2026",
  "organization": "scottish-government-spatial-data-infrastructure",
  "organizationTitle": "Scottish Government SpatialData.gov.scot",
  "licenseId": null,
  "licenseTitle": null,
  "isOpen": false,
  "tags": null,
  "groups": null,
  "resourceCount": 2,
  "resourceFormats": "ZIP",
  "resourceUrls": "https://www.sepa.org.uk/environment/environmental-data/ | https://www2.sepa.org.uk/flooddata/SEPA_Surface_Water_Flood_Maps_v2_1.zip",
  "state": "active",
  "createdAt": "2026-09-18T17:06:16.481721",
  "modifiedAt": "2026-09-18T17:06:16.481725",
  "query": "whole catalogue",
  "page": 1,
  "scrapedAt": "2026-09-19T11:22:03.517Z"
}

How to use

Option A — whole catalogues

{
  "maxItems": 2000,
  "maxPagesPerPortal": 10,
  "portalUrls": [
    "https://data.gov.uk",
    "https://open.canada.ca/data"
  ]
}

1. Open the Actor and fill in the first field.
2. Set the page limit and Max items to bound the run.
3. Click Start, then export from the Output tab.

Option B — filtered by topic

{
  "maxItems": 2000,
  "maxPagesPerPortal": 10,
  "portalUrls": [
    "https://data.gov.uk"
  ],
  "searchQueries": [
    "transport",
    "housing"
  ]
}

Everything in the first field is processed independently, so you can batch several targets into one run and split them apart afterwards.

Input parameters

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
portalUrls	array	–	Home pages of the CKAN open-data portals to scrape, e.
searchQueries	array	[]	Terms to search for on each portal.
maxPagesPerPortal	integer	4	How many result pages to walk for each portal.
maxItems	integer	500	Stop after this many datasets.
maxConcurrency	integer	2	Parallel requests.
proxyConfiguration	object	{"useApifyProxy": true}	Proxy used to fetch pages.

Tips for best results

• Paste the portal's home page — the Actor appends the CKAN API path for you.
• Leave the query empty to walk the whole portal; add one to focus the run.
• The API accepts up to 1,000 datasets per request, so exports need very few calls.
• resourceUrls gives you a ready download manifest without opening a single dataset page.
• isOpen is the quickest filter when you intend to redistribute the data.
• organization is the best way to slice a national portal into publishers.
• Some portals mount CKAN under a path such as /data; paste that full path and it still works.
• Schedule a monthly run to track what a portal newly published.
• Run several portals in one job and split them afterwards with portalDomain.
• CKAN defines author, maintainer and version fields, but three national portals filled none of them across 90 sampled datasets, so they are not included.
• Licence and group columns are filled by some portals and left blank by others — data.gov.uk publishes no licence, open.canada.ca publishes one for every dataset.

Integrations

Send results straight into the tools you already use: Google Sheets, Slack, Zapier, Make, Airtable or any Webhook. You can also schedule the Actor to run hourly, daily or weekly and have each run append to the same dataset, which is how you build a price or availability history rather than a one-off snapshot.

API usage

Run the Actor and collect results from any language. Replace <YOUR_TOKEN> with your Apify API token.

cURL

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/logiover~ckan-open-data-portal-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=<YOUR_TOKEN>" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"maxItems": 2000, "maxPagesPerPortal": 10, "portalUrls": ["https://data.gov.uk", "https://open.canada.ca/data"]}'

Node.js

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: '<YOUR_TOKEN>' });
const run = await client.actor('logiover/ckan-open-data-portal-scraper').call({"maxItems": 2000, "maxPagesPerPortal": 10, "portalUrls": ["https://data.gov.uk", "https://open.canada.ca/data"]});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient('<YOUR_TOKEN>')
run = client.actor('logiover/ckan-open-data-portal-scraper').call(run_input={"maxItems": 2000, "maxPagesPerPortal": 10, "portalUrls": ["https://data.gov.uk", "https://open.canada.ca/data"]})
for item in client.dataset(run['defaultDatasetId']).iterate_items():
    print(item)

Use with AI agents (MCP)

This Actor is available through the Apify MCP server, so an AI agent can call it as a tool. Point your agent at https://mcp.apify.com and it can run the CKAN Scraper on demand — for example: "Pull the first 500 datasets from CKAN and summarise what you find." The agent receives the same structured rows you would get from the UI.

FAQ

Do I need a CKAN account or API key?

No. The Actor reads publicly available data only. There is nothing to authenticate and no credentials to rotate.

How many datasets can I get in one run?

As many as the source exposes. Raise the page limit and Max items together; the run stops at whichever limit it reaches first.

Why did I get fewer rows than I asked for?

The source ran out of datasets. That is normal for narrow searches — broaden the query or add more targets to one run.

Are results de-duplicated?

Yes. Each dataset is emitted once per run, even when it appears on several pages, so you are never billed twice for the same record.

Why are some fields empty?

CKAN does not publish every attribute for every dataset. Empty means the source did not supply it, not that extraction failed.

What export formats are supported?

JSON, CSV, Excel, HTML and RSS from the Output tab, plus the Apify API and any integration you connect.

How fast is it?

It is pure HTTP with no browser, so a page of results typically takes a second or two. Raise Max concurrency carefully — the source rate-limits aggressive crawling.

Can I schedule it?

Yes. Use the Apify scheduler to run it on any interval and append each run to the same dataset for time-series analysis.

Does it work behind a proxy?

It uses Apify Proxy automatically. You can switch groups or supply your own proxies in Proxy configuration.

How often does the data change?

CKAN updates continuously. Re-run whenever you need current data; the Actor always reads the live source, never a cache.

Is the output schema stable?

Yes. Field names and types are fixed, so downstream pipelines will not break between runs.

What if the source changes its format?

Open an issue on the Issues tab and it gets fixed. The Actor is actively maintained.

Is it legal?

This Actor reads only publicly available data from CKAN — the same content any visitor or client sees without logging in. It does not bypass authentication, does not collect private data and does not attempt to defeat access controls. You are responsible for how you use the output: respect the source's terms of service, applicable copyright, and data-protection law such as GDPR where personal data is involved. Scraping public data is generally lawful in the EU and the US, but the responsibility for the downstream use of that data sits with you.

Related scrapers

• Eurostat Scraper — European statistics
• World Bank Scraper — Global indicators
• Zenodo Scraper — Research datasets
• DataCite Scraper — Dataset DOIs