Zhihu Columns & Articles Scraper

Paste a Zhihu column or article URL and get the title, author, upvotes, comments, excerpt and HTML body as JSON or CSV.

Public guest pages only. A column URL walks that column and returns one row per article. An article URL returns that single article. No Zhihu login, no browser.

$3 per 1,000 articles, plus a $0.005 start fee.

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Why Use This Scraper?

• No login. The actor reads public column and article pages. It does not ask for a cookie and it does not mint one.
• Column lists carry the longer HTML. The column endpoint returns the article body we measured at about 3,000 characters. The single-article endpoint for the same id returns a shorter body.
• One row per article. Title, author, headline, votes, comments, excerpt, HTML, image and URL. Ready for a sheet or an API pull.
• You set the cap. Default is 20 articles. A busy column can hold hundreds, so maxItems stops the run where you want it.
• Pay per article returned. Empty or skipped URLs are not billed as articles.

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Overview

This actor turns a Zhihu column or a Zhihu article into a flat dataset. The entity is an article (zhuanlan), not a question and not a search hit.

A column URL such as https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/xuehy pages through that column's public item list. Each item becomes one row, and the HTML on that row comes from the list payload.

An article URL such as https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/2084570146228664180 fetches that article on its own. That path also returns topics. The HTML on that path is shorter than the same article's HTML inside a column list.

Search, question pages and answer threads need a logged-in Zhihu session. This actor does not log in, so those URLs are skipped and written to the log.

Zhihu marks guest bodies with contentTruncated: true even when the column list already returned a few thousand characters of HTML. Salt-select (盐选) pieces that Zhihu keeps behind a purchase stay on the excerpt.

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Supported Inputs

Input	What you get
https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/{slug}	Every article in that column, up to maxItems
https://www.zhihu.com/column/{slug}	Same column list
Column slug, e.g. xuehy	Same column list
https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/{id}	One article
Numeric article id	One article

Copy-paste column run:

{
    "startUrls": ["https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/xuehy"],
    "maxItems": 20
}

Not supported, and dropped with a log line:

• https://www.zhihu.com/question/{id}
• https://www.zhihu.com/search?q=...
• Answer URLs
• People profile URLs as a listing

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Use Cases

Who	What they do with the rows
Research	Read a columnist's public essays without clicking through each post
Media monitoring	Track a named column for new titles, votes and comment counts
Market notes	Pull Chinese-language commentary on a topic a column already covers
Archives	Save the public HTML of articles you can already open in a browser
Agents	Hand a column URL to an Apify call and read a flat article list

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How It Works

1. You pass column URLs, article URLs, slugs or numeric ids.
2. Each value is classified. Question and search links are skipped.
3. A column is read from Zhihu's public column-items API, page by page, until maxItems or the last page.
4. An article id that did not already come from a column is fetched from the public article API.
5. Each article is pushed as one dataset row. On Apify, that row is the billed result.

Pure HTTP. No browser.

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Input Configuration

Field	Type	Required	Notes
startUrls	string[]	no	Column and article URLs. Prefill: https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/xuehy. If every list is empty, that column is used.
columnIds	string[]	no	Slugs such as xuehy.
articleIds	string[]	no	Numeric ids such as 2084570146228664180.
maxItems	integer	no	Default 20. Minimum 1. Free plans cap at 100.
maxConcurrency	integer	no	Default 5. Range 1–20. Applies to article-detail calls. Column pages stay sequential.

Column, 5 articles

{
    "startUrls": ["https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/xuehy"],
    "maxItems": 5
}

One article

{
    "articleIds": ["2084570146228664180"],
    "maxItems": 1
}

Column plus one extra article

{
    "startUrls": ["https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/xuehy"],
    "articleIds": ["2082752758818649391"],
    "maxItems": 10
}

The column list is collected first. An article id already present in that list is not fetched a second time.

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Output Overview

Every row is one article. There is no separate column row and no padding row. Column name is the slug on each article (columnSlug).

source is column when the row came from a column list, and article when it came from the article endpoint. Column rows carry the longer HTML. Article rows add topics when Zhihu sends them. contentTruncated follows Zhihu's own guest flag.

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Output Samples

Column list, https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/xuehy, first article. HTML below is cut for the README. The live row's content was 3,015 characters.

{
    "entityType": "article",
    "articleId": "2084570146228664180",
    "title": "复利没那么温柔：为什么十年十倍的故事，你复制不了？",
    "excerpt": "“复利”几乎是所有长期投资叙事中最有吸引力的词。…",
    "content": "<p>“复利”几乎是所有长期投资叙事中最有吸引力的词。</p>",
    "contentTruncated": true,
    "voteupCount": 2,
    "commentCount": 1,
    "authorName": "薛洪言",
    "authorHeadline": "星图金融研究院常务副院长、硕士生导师",
    "authorId": "4d4d42d4d525a7f8f2c74925fb5f8db7",
    "authorUrl": "https://www.zhihu.com/people/xuehongyan",
    "columnSlug": "xuehy",
    "imageUrl": "https://picx.zhimg.com/v2-9349de0aae106773e9470667658217a3_720w.jpg",
    "url": "https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/2084570146228664180",
    "createdAt": "2026-09-19T01:18:22.000Z",
    "updatedAt": "2026-09-19T01:18:22.000Z",
    "topics": [],
    "source": "column"
}

The same id fetched as an article (not via the column list) returned content of 769 characters, excerpt of 128 characters, and topics A股（人民币普通股票） and 股票交易策略. Author, votes and comment count matched.

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Key Output Fields

Identity

• articleId, url, entityType (article), source (column or article)
• columnSlug when the article belongs to a column

Text

• title, excerpt, content (HTML)
• contentTruncated — Zhihu's guest flag. A true value can still sit on a multi-thousand-character column body.

Author

• authorName, authorHeadline, authorId, authorUrl

Engagement

• voteupCount, commentCount
• topics — filled on article-detail rows when Zhihu sends them. Column-list rows in the sample above had an empty list.

Media and time

• imageUrl
• createdAt, updatedAt — ISO timestamps

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FAQ

Does it search Zhihu? No. Search, questions and answers ask for a login. Those URLs are skipped.

What does a column run actually request? GET https://www.zhihu.com/api/v4/columns/{slug}/items?limit=10&offset=0, then the next offset, until maxItems or Zhihu says the list is finished. Ten articles per page. Pages run one after another.

What does an article run request? GET https://www.zhihu.com/api/v4/articles/{id} with the public fields content, excerpt, voteup_count, comment_count, author, topics and column. The request is signed as a guest. No d_c0 cookie is sent. Sending that cookie is what flips Zhihu into its click-challenge, so the actor leaves it off.

Can I mix a column and an article id? Yes. The column is walked first. If that article id already appeared in the column, it is not fetched again.

What if the slug or id is wrong? A failed column page or article is logged and counted as a failure. The rest of the run continues. A bad id does not produce a billed row, because a row is only pushed after a title comes back.

Is there a free-plan cap? On Apify, accounts that are not on a paid plan are limited to 100 articles per run. The Store's automated tester is limited to 1.

How many retries? Each URL is tried up to 4 times, with a new proxy address each time. A login wall (40353) or an abnormal-request block (40362) stops that URL immediately. Those are not transient proxy errors.

Why is the article HTML shorter than the column HTML? They are different Zhihu endpoints. For article 2084570146228664180 the column list returned 3,015 characters and the article endpoint returned 769. Use a column URL when you want the longer public HTML.

What does contentTruncated: true mean? Zhihu sets that flag on guest responses. It does not mean the field is empty. Paid 盐选 bodies that Zhihu does not show to guests stay on the excerpt.

Will a question id work if I paste the number? A long numeric id is treated as an article id. Question URLs are rejected before any request.

How much does a run cost? $0.005 when the run starts, then $0.003 for each article row. Five articles cost about $0.02.

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Support

• Bugs and field requests: the actor's Issues tab at memo23/zhihu-scraper.
• More actors from the same developer: apify.com/memo23.

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Additional Services

Need a scheduled column feed, a different field set, or a push into a sheet or warehouse? Custom work is available through the Issues tab.

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Explore More Scrapers

Same developer, same pay-per-result model:

• Quora Scraper — public Quora questions and answers
• Douyin Scraper — public Douyin posts
• The rest of the catalogue is on the memo23 Store page

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🤖 For AI Agents & LLM Apps

Compact reference for agents calling this actor via the Apify MCP server or the Apify API (memo23/zhihu-scraper).

Purpose: Public Zhihu column articles, or one article by id. No search, no Q&A, no login.

Minimal input:

{ "startUrls": ["https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/xuehy"], "maxItems": 5 }

Output fields: entityType, articleId, title, excerpt, content, contentTruncated, voteupCount, commentCount, authorName, authorHeadline, authorId, authorUrl, columnSlug, imageUrl, url, createdAt, updatedAt, topics, source.

Billing: $0.005 actor start + $0.003 per dataset row. Skipped question/search URLs are not billed.

Behavior: Column rows have the longer HTML and often empty topics. Article-detail rows are shorter and may include topics. contentTruncated can be true on a full-looking column body. Do not send question URLs.

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⚠️ Disclaimer

This Actor is an independent tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Zhihu Inc. or any of its subsidiaries. All trademarks mentioned are the property of their respective owners.

The scraper accesses only publicly available Zhihu column and article pages. It does not log in, and it does not collect search results, questions, answers, or content Zhihu only shows to a signed-in member. Users are responsible for ensuring their use complies with Zhihu's Terms of Service, applicable data-protection law (GDPR, CCPA, etc.), and any contractual obligations of their own organization.

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