Reddit Historical Archive Scraper for Posts and Comments

🗃️ Find Reddit's public history

Researchers, journalists, analysts, and developers can use Reddit Historical Archive Scraper to find public Reddit posts and comments from past date ranges. It saves structured rows with text, authors, subreddits, dates, scores, links, and archive details when the source provides them. Use those rows to study older discussions, compare communities over time, or prepare text for search and retrieval.

Try these workflows

• Collect historical data for a chosen date range with Reddit Historical Data Scraper.
• Search a phrase in old public content with Reddit Archive Search.
• Find a user's posts or comments with Reddit Author Scraper.
• Collect one community's posts with Reddit Subreddit Scraper.
• Look for topic matches in comments with Reddit Comment Scraper.
• Collect post rows for review with Reddit Post Scraper.

📚 Archived Reddit posts and comments

Each saved row is one public archived post or comment. The recordType field shows which shape the row uses. Posts can include title, body text, author, subreddit, timestamps, URLs, scores, flair, media, moderation state, and archive provenance. Comments can include text, author, subreddit, timestamps, URL, score, flair, parent and related-post links, moderation state, and archive provenance. Optional fields appear when the archive supplies them.

Useful facts

• The stable Reddit id helps you join a post or comment with other data.
• The public url gives you a source page to review.
• provenance can include the archive name and known time and volume coverage.
• text is normalized for embedding or retrieval when post body text is available.

▶️ Search the archive in a few steps

Run steps

1. Choose posts, comments, or both as the result type.
2. Choose one discovery method: subreddit, author, post, or url.
3. Enter one or more values for that target.
4. Add date bounds, a search phrase, a minimum score, or a result order when needed.
5. Use the two limits for a smaller first run, then start the Actor and open the dataset.

A narrow date range and a small limit leave less data to review. The form uses one discovery method per run. Use separate runs for different search setups, while lists of values of the same kind remain supported.

⚙️ Input

Input fields

Field	Type	What it does
resultType	string	Chooses posts, comments, or both.
discoveryMethod	string	Chooses subreddit, author, post, or url as the target kind.
subredditNames	array of strings	Adds one or more subreddit names without the r/ prefix.
authorNames	array of strings	Adds one or more Reddit usernames without the u/ prefix. The Actor searches posts, comments, or both for each author.
postIds	array of strings	Adds one or more Reddit post IDs. The Actor retrieves matching archived posts or their comments in the date range.
redditUrls	array of objects	Adds one or more public Reddit URL objects for archived targets.
redditUrls[].url	string	A full public Reddit URL that starts with https://.
startDate	string	An optional lower UTC creation-date bound. Records created before it are skipped. Use YYYY-MM-DD.
endDate	string	An optional upper UTC creation-date bound. Records created after it are skipped. Use YYYY-MM-DD.
searchPhrase	string	An optional phrase checked in post titles and body text or in comment body text. With both, it is checked in both types.
minScore	integer	An optional minimum engagement score. Records with a lower score are skipped.
sortOrder	string	Chooses newest or oldest creation order.
maxCommentsPerPost	integer	Limits comments for post ID or Reddit URL targets when comments are selected. Leave it empty to return all available comments until the source is exhausted.
maxItems	integer	Limits returned posts or comments in the run. Leave it empty to return all available records until the source is exhausted. The schema has no fixed upper bound.

The required fields are resultType and discoveryMethod. Dates use UTC.

Input example

This is the public input from a successful run.

{
  "resultType": "posts",
  "discoveryMethod": "subreddit",
  "subredditNames": [
    "AskReddit"
  ],
  "sortOrder": "newest",
  "maxItems": 100
}

🧾 Output

The Output panel links to the dataset. Each dataset item uses one of the two shapes below, and recordType tells you which one it is. Optional fields are present when the archive supplies them.

Post rows

Field	Type	What it does
recordType	string	Identifies this shape as post.
id	string	Gives the stable Reddit ID for joining this post with other data.
title	string	Gives the post title.
text	string	Gives normalized post body text when body text is available.
author	object	Groups public author details when available.
author.name	string	Gives the public Reddit username of the author.
subreddit	string	Gives the Reddit community where the post was published.
createdAt	string	Gives the UTC creation time.
editedAt	string	Gives the UTC edit time when the archive supplies it.
url	string	Gives the public Reddit URL for the post.
score	integer	Gives the engagement score recorded by the archive.
upvoteRatio	number	Gives the archive's upvote ratio from 0 to 1.
commentCount	integer	Gives the number of comments recorded for the post.
flair	string	Gives the post flair when available.
media	array of objects	Lists media attached to the post when available.
media[].type	string	Gives the source media type for one media item.
media[].url	string	Gives the public URL for one media item.
moderation	object	Groups moderation states recorded for the post.
moderation.removed	boolean	Says whether the archive marks the post as removed.
moderation.locked	boolean	Says whether the archive marks the post as locked.
moderation.archived	boolean	Says whether the archive marks the post as archived on Reddit.
moderation.stickied	boolean	Says whether the archive marks the post as stickied.
provenance	object	Groups the archive source and coverage facts for the post.
provenance.archiveName	string	Gives the name of the public archive that supplied the post.
provenance.coverage	object	Groups known time and volume coverage for the target.
provenance.coverage.earliestCreatedAt	string	Gives the earliest creation time covered for the target.
provenance.coverage.latestCreatedAt	string	Gives the latest creation time covered for the target.
provenance.coverage.availableRecordCount	integer	Gives the number of records the archive reports for the target.

Genuine post row

{
  "recordType": "post",
  "id": "kmtys6",
  "title": "What made the Cambodian Genocide a genocide?",
  "subreddit": "AskHistorians",
  "createdAt": "2020-12-30T03:28:06.000Z",
  "url": "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/kmtys6/what_made_the_cambodian_genocide_a_genocide/",
  "provenance": {
    "archiveName": "arctic-shift.photon-reddit.com",
    "coverage": {
      "earliestCreatedAt": "2020-12-30T03:28:06.000Z",
      "latestCreatedAt": "2020-12-30T03:28:06.000Z",
      "availableRecordCount": 1
    }
  },
  "text": "I understand why a lot of other genocides qualify as genocides since they are one group trying to wipe out another. But the Cambodian Genocide seems different to me in that that doesn’t seem to be the case. Based on what I have read about it, it seems like what happened in Cambodia was a mass killing by the government of its own people. That’s certainly horrible but that just sounds like mass murder rather than genocide. Was there an effort to wipe out non-Cambodians at the time that I am not aware of?",
  "author": {
    "name": "historydude420"
  },
  "score": 3,
  "upvoteRatio": 0.6700000166893005,
  "commentCount": 8,
  "moderation": {
    "locked": false,
    "archived": false,
    "stickied": false
  }
}

Comment rows

Field	Type	What it does
recordType	string	Identifies this shape as comment.
id	string	Gives the stable Reddit ID for joining this comment with other data.
text	string	Gives normalized comment body text.
author	object	Groups public author details when available.
author.name	string	Gives the public Reddit username of the author.
subreddit	string	Gives the Reddit community where the comment was posted.
createdAt	string	Gives the UTC creation time.
editedAt	string	Gives the UTC edit time when the archive supplies it.
url	string	Gives the public Reddit URL for the comment.
score	integer	Gives the engagement score recorded by the archive.
flair	string	Gives the comment flair when available.
parent	object	Groups the parent post or comment when the archive supplies the relationship.
parent.id	string	Gives the stable ID of the parent item.
parent.type	string	Identifies the parent as post or comment.
post	object	Groups related post details when the archive supplies them.
post.id	string	Gives the stable ID of the related post.
post.title	string	Gives the title of the related post when available.
post.url	string	Gives the public URL of the related post when available.
moderation	object	Groups moderation states recorded for the comment.
moderation.locked	boolean	Says whether the archive marks the comment as locked.
moderation.archived	boolean	Says whether the archive marks the comment as archived on Reddit.
moderation.stickied	boolean	Says whether the archive marks the comment as stickied.
provenance	object	Groups the archive source and coverage facts for the comment.
provenance.archiveName	string	Gives the name of the public archive that supplied the comment.
provenance.coverage	object	Groups known time and volume coverage for the target.
provenance.coverage.earliestCreatedAt	string	Gives the earliest creation time covered for the target.
provenance.coverage.latestCreatedAt	string	Gives the latest creation time covered for the target.
provenance.coverage.availableRecordCount	integer	Gives the number of records the archive reports for the target.

Genuine comment row

{
  "recordType": "comment",
  "id": "ghh2v1p",
  "text": "Happy to write up an answer to this, but in the meantime you could look at this answer [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/8dgspn/were_the_crimes_of_the_khmer_rouge_a_unique_form/) and  [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/9506jd/how_controverse_is_the_term_genocide_among/) or for an answer I made for my youtube channel addressing this question [here](https://youtu.be/D7JkO0ZmQHk)",
  "subreddit": "AskHistorians",
  "createdAt": "2020-12-30T05:49:01.000Z",
  "url": "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/kmtys6/what_made_the_cambodian_genocide_a_genocide/ghh2v1p/",
  "provenance": {
    "archiveName": "arctic-shift.photon-reddit.com",
    "coverage": {
      "earliestCreatedAt": "2020-12-30T03:28:06.000Z",
      "latestCreatedAt": "2020-12-31T21:41:27.000Z",
      "availableRecordCount": 5
    }
  },
  "author": {
    "name": "ShadowsofUtopia"
  },
  "editedAt": "2021-01-01T00:48:27.000Z",
  "score": 5,
  "flair": "Cambodian History | The Khmer Rouge",
  "parent": {
    "id": "kmtys6",
    "type": "post"
  },
  "post": {
    "id": "kmtys6",
    "title": "What made the Cambodian Genocide a genocide?",
    "url": "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/kmtys6/what_made_the_cambodian_genocide_a_genocide/"
  },
  "moderation": {
    "locked": false,
    "stickied": false
  }
}

💳 Pricing

How charging works

Pricing uses one event for each public archived Reddit post or comment saved to the dataset. A run with no saved post or comment does not create this result event. The current price is shown in the Pricing tab.

Use maxItems to bound post and comment rows. For post ID or Reddit URL runs with comments, maxCommentsPerPost bounds the comments. Leave either limit empty to return all available results until the source is exhausted.

🔌 Integrations

Run the Actor in Apify Console or through the Apify API. Use the dataset link to download the rows or pass them to another step in your workflow. Apify schedules and webhooks can help with repeat runs and run notifications.

❓ FAQ

Can I choose posts, comments, or both?

Yes. Set resultType to posts, comments, or both. Every row says post or comment in recordType.

Can I search inside comment text?

Yes. Set searchPhrase. It checks post titles and body text, and it checks comment body text when comments are in scope.

How do the date fields work?

startDate and endDate use UTC and YYYY-MM-DD. Records before the start date or after the end date are skipped.

Can one run use several target kinds?

Choose one discoveryMethod per run: subreddit, author, post, or url. You can submit several values of that kind. Use separate runs for different search setups.

Can I get every comment in a thread?

A post ID or Reddit URL can be used for a run where comments are selected. The archive may not contain every comment or ancestor, so the Actor does not promise a complete nested tree.

Why is a field missing?

Many fields are optional. A value is included when the archive supplies it, and missing source facts are not filled in.

Does it read live or private Reddit content?

No. It retrieves public archived content. It is not a live feed, cannot access private communities, and cannot restore content absent from the archive, including deleted or removed records.

Do I need a Reddit login or API key?

No. The Actor retrieves public archive content without a Reddit login, OAuth or API key, or a customer-supplied source credential.

What happens when I leave a limit empty?

maxItems returns all available posts or comments until the source is exhausted. maxCommentsPerPost does the same for available comments under a post target. Use a limit when you want less data to review.

How can I keep a first run easy to review?

Use one target, a narrow date range, and a small maxItems value. For a post target with comments, set maxCommentsPerPost too.

📝 Changelog

0.0: Initial release

🆘 Support

For issues, questions, or feature requests, file a ticket and I'll fix or implement it in less than 24h 🫡

🔗 Related Actors

• Reddit Comments Search Scraper. Use it for focused public comment keyword searches.
• Reddit Scraper. Use it for broader public Reddit post, comment, community, or user collection.
• Reddit Media Downloader. Use it when you need source-hosted media links from Reddit posts.
• Reddit Historical Archive Scraper. Use it to compare another historical Reddit archive workflow.
• Reddit Historical Archive Scraper — RAG & Comment Search. Use it when you need historical Reddit text for RAG or comment search.

Made with ❤️ by Maxime Dupré