Scholarly Papers Search (Google Scholar alternative, OpenAlex)

Search 250M+ scholarly works via the official OpenAlex API: DOI, authors, citations, open-access PDF links, abstracts, with no login, no browser and no code. Export to JSON, CSV or Excel, or use the API.

Search 250M+ scholarly works through the official OpenAlex API: title, DOI, authors, institutions, venue, year, citation count, open-access PDF link, topics and abstract. Search by keyword, author name or DOI list, filter by year/open access/type, sort by citations or newest, and monitor new papers per query.

Use cases

• Literature reviews and citation-ranked reading lists
• Find researchers / institutions for B2B outreach in a field
• Alerts on new papers for a topic or author

Input

Field	Type	Notes
queries	array	Keywords searched in title, abstract and full text.
authorNames	array	Return works by the best-matching OpenAlex author.
dois	array	Look up specific papers by DOI or doi.org URL.
fromYear	integer
toYear	integer
openAccessOnly	boolean
workType	string
sortBy	string
maxResultsPerQuery	integer
includeAbstract	boolean
contactEmail	string	Sent to OpenAlex for its faster polite pool.
monitorMode	boolean	Remember seen works per query; later runs flag/output only new ones.
stateStoreName	string

Example input

{
 "queries": [
  "large language models agriculture"
 ],
 "authorNames": [
  "Geoffrey Hinton"
 ],
 "dois": [
  "10.1038/nature14539",
  "10.9999/not-a-real-doi-zz"
 ],
 "maxResultsPerQuery": 3,
 "sortBy": "citations",
 "monitorMode": true
}

Output

One dataset item per result. Main columns: title, publicationYear, venue, authors, citedByCount, isOpenAccess, pdfUrl, doi, isNew, error. A RUN_SUMMARY record is saved to the default key-value store. See the sample output in the Output tab.

OpenAlex API key (optional)

OpenAlex's API has a small free daily budget without a key. For large jobs, paste your own free key from openalex.org/settings/api into apiKey; OpenAlex usage then counts against your key (10x budget, pay-as-you-go beyond). The run summary reports apiCostUsd.

Example output

{
  "input": "10.1038/nature14539",
  "openalexId": "https://openalex.org/W2919115771",
  "doi": "https://doi.org/10.1038/nature14539",
  "title": "Deep learning",
  "publicationYear": 2015,
  "publicationDate": "2015-05-26",
  "type": "article",
  "venue": "Nature",
  "publisher": "Nature Portfolio",
  "authors": [
    "Yann LeCun",
    "Yoshua Bengio",
    "Geoffrey E. Hinton"
  ],
  "institutions": [
    "Meta (United States)",
    "New York University",
    "Université de Montréal"
  ],
  "citedByCount": 84498,
  "fwci": 3080.0301,
  "isOpenAccess": true,
  "oaStatus": "green",
  "pdfUrl": "https://hal.science/hal-04206682",
  "landingPageUrl": "https://doi.org/10.1038/nature14539",
  "topics": [
    "Neural Networks and Applications",
    "Advanced Neural Network Applications",
    "Domain Adaptation and Few-Shot Learning"
  ]
}

Pricing

Pay per result, with no monthly rental or subscription:

• Paper record: $0.001

Example: 1,000 results cost about $1.00 in fees. Apify's free plan includes $5 of monthly credit, which is enough to test this Actor.

FAQ

Do I need an account, cookies or a login for the source site? No. Scholarly Papers Search uses public data sources only, so there is nothing to connect and no account to risk.

How much will a run cost? You pay only for results delivered (see Pricing above), plus Apify platform usage, which the free plan's monthly credit easily covers for test runs. Start with a small limit to see the exact cost per run.

Can I export to CSV, Excel or Google Sheets? Yes. Every run's dataset can be downloaded as JSON, CSV, Excel, XML or HTML, or pushed to Google Sheets, Make, Zapier, n8n, Slack or a webhook through Apify integrations.

Can I run it on a schedule or from my own code? Yes. Add an Apify Schedule (hourly, daily, weekly) or call it through the Apify API / Python & JavaScript clients. It also works with AI agents through the Apify MCP server.

What happens if an input is invalid or a source is down? The run keeps going. The bad input gets a row with an error field so you can see what failed, and you are not charged for results that were not delivered.

Is this legal to use? It collects publicly available data. You are responsible for using the output in line with the source's terms and privacy laws such as GDPR/CCPA; don't use it for spam.

Something missing or broken? Open an issue on the Issues tab. Feature requests are usually added within a few days.

Scheduling / monitoring

Create a Schedule (daily/weekly) and connect a webhook or Slack/email integration.

Fair use

Official public APIs only, no login. Do not use output for spam or harassment. Respect the data sources' rate limits and terms.

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REST API

GET https://api.mediaprotools.com/v1/openalex-scholar?items=... (header X-API-Key). Up to 5 items per call, separated by ,. Or POST {"items":[...],"options":{...}}.

Parameter	Type	Notes
items	token	Keywords searched in title, abstract and full text.
authorNames	array	Return works by the best-matching OpenAlex author.
dois	array	Look up specific papers by DOI or doi.org URL.
fromYear	integer 1800-2100	From year
toYear	integer 1800-2100	To year
openAccessOnly	boolean	Open access only
workType	string	Work type
sortBy	string	Sort by
maxResultsPerQuery	integer 1-100	Max results per query/author
includeAbstract	boolean	Include abstract
contactEmail	string	Sent to OpenAlex for its faster polite pool.
apiKey	string	Free key from openalex.org/settings/api. Without it, runs share OpenAlex's small keyless daily budget and large jobs may stop with a budget error. With it, OpenAlex usage counts against your own free (10x) or paid budget.

Output fields: abstract, authors, citedByCount, doi, fwci, input, institutions, isNew, isOpenAccess, keywords, landingPageUrl, language, oaStatus, openalexId, pdfUrl, publicationDate, publicationYear, publisher, referencedWorksCount, retracted, title, topics, totalMatches, type, venue.