# Cars & Bids Auction Scraper (`muhammadafzal/cars-and-bids-scraper`) Actor

Scrape public Cars & Bids auctions for vehicle specs, prices, sellers, bids, locations, descriptions, and image URLs. No login or bidding.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/muhammadafzal/cars-and-bids-scraper.md
- **Developed by:** [Muhammad Afzal](https://apify.com/muhammadafzal) (community)
- **Categories:** Other, Automation
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

from $30.00 / 1,000 auction record returneds

This Actor is paid per event and usage. You are charged both the fixed price for specific events and for Apify platform usage.

Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/platform/actors/running/actors-in-store#pay-per-event

## What's an Apify Actor?

Actors are web data automations that power AI and operations. They run on the Apify platform to scrape websites, process data, connect APIs, and automate workflows.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.
Actors are written with capital "A".

## How to integrate an Actor?

If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.
The best way to integrate Actors is as follows.

- **AI agents and MCP clients** — the [Apify MCP server](https://docs.apify.com/integrations/mcp.md) at `https://mcp.apify.com` (remote, streamable HTTP, OAuth on first use).
- **Agentic workflows and local Actor development** — [Agent Skills](https://apify.com/.well-known/agent-skills/index.json) with the [Apify CLI](https://docs.apify.com/cli/docs.md): `npm install -g apify-cli`, then `apify login`.
- **JavaScript/TypeScript projects** — the official [JS/TS client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md): `npm install apify-client`.
- **Python projects** — the official [Python client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md): `pip install apify-client`.
- **Any other language** — the [REST API](https://docs.apify.com/api/v2.md).

For usage examples, see the [API](#api) section below.

For more details, see Apify documentation as [Markdown index](https://docs.apify.com/llms.txt) and [Markdown full-text](https://docs.apify.com/llms-full.txt).

# README

## Cars & Bids Scraper

Scrape public Cars & Bids search, browse, results, and auction pages. Each dataset item is one auction with vehicle specifications, current/final bid, auction status, seller, location, bid counts, description, and image URLs.

The actor uses a Playwright browser to load search/browse pages and discover auction listings. Vehicle details are then fetched through Cars & Bids' own first-party JSON API from inside the warmed browser session (same IP, cookies, and session), which avoids the access challenge that direct detail-page navigation triggers. If the API is unavailable, the actor falls back to parsing the detail-page HTML. It detects Cloudflare or other access challenges and stops with a truthful warning when no data can be collected. It does not sign in, place bids, bypass access controls, or collect private account data.

### Input

Use `startUrls` or `searchUrls`. Examples:

```json
{
  "startUrls": [{ "url": "https://carsandbids.com/search/honda" }],
  "maxResults": 25,
  "includeDetails": true
}
```

Direct auction pages such as `https://carsandbids.com/auctions/K1GDYq2n/factory-five-type-65-coupe` are also supported. When no URL is supplied, the actor uses a public Honda search page as a prefill path.

### Output

Records include `auctionId`, `title`, `url`, `status`, `price`, `year`, `make`, `model`, `mileage`, `vin`, `location`, `transmission`, `bodyStyle`, `engine`, `drivetrain`, `seller`, bid/view/watch counts, `description`, `imageUrls`, and `scrapedAt`. Run diagnostics are written to the `SUMMARY` key-value record.

### Pricing

This Actor uses Pay Per Event pricing: **$0.03 per auction record delivered**. A run returning 10 records costs $0.30 in event charges, in addition to any platform usage charged by Apify. Blocked or empty runs return no auction records and incur no result-event charges. The maximum result-event cost is `$0.03 × maxResults`.

### Limits and access

`maxResults` is capped at 500 and `maxPages` at 50. The actor uses the known-good US Apify proxy group for the owner account by default, keeps one browser session consistent, persists cookies, limits request rate/concurrency, and rotates the session after a challenge response. Proxy availability depends on the Apify account and region; provide another available group in `proxyConfiguration` when needed. Results reflect public page content at scrape time. This Actor does not sign in, place bids, solve CAPTCHAs, bypass access controls, or collect private account data.

### Changelog

- **2026-08-14 (1.1):** Fixed Cars & Bids challenging detail-page navigation under the external proxy. Auction details are now fetched through Cars & Bids' first-party signed JSON API from within the warmed browser session (same IP, cookies, and session), with HTML parsing kept as a fallback. Direct auction URLs are fetched the same way (via the API) instead of navigating to the auction page. Discovery via search/browse pages is unchanged.

### Known limitations

- Cars & Bids' Cloudflare WAF can return HTTP 403 for some free-text search terms (for example `search/miata`) from cloud proxy IPs, even though the same query loads from a normal residential connection. Make-based searches (for example `search/honda`) and direct auction URLs are reliably accessible. When a search page is blocked, the actor reports the block truthfully and returns no records for that URL rather than fabricating data.

# Actor input Schema

## `startUrls` (type: `array`):

Optional Cars & Bids search, browse, past-auctions, or direct auction URLs. If omitted, the actor uses a public Honda search page.

## `searchUrls` (type: `array`):

Optional Cars & Bids search URLs, one per line. Direct auction URLs are also accepted.

## `maxResults` (type: `integer`):

Maximum unique auction records to return across all input URLs.

## `maxPages` (type: `integer`):

Maximum search/browse pages to visit. Direct auction pages are still processed.

## `includeDetails` (type: `boolean`):

Fetch each auction page for vehicle specifications, seller, bids, images, and description. Disable for lightweight discovery output.

## `proxyConfiguration` (type: `object`):

Use the configured authorized external proxy by default; falls back to the Apify US proxy group when external proxy credentials are unavailable. Set useExternalProxy to false to force Apify Proxy.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "startUrls": [
    {
      "url": "https://carsandbids.com/search/honda"
    }
  ],
  "maxResults": 50,
  "maxPages": 5,
  "includeDetails": true,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true,
    "useExternalProxy": true,
    "apifyProxyGroups": [
      "BUYPROXIES94952"
    ],
    "countryCode": "US"
  }
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `dataset` (type: `string`):

Structured auction records returned by the actor.

## `datasetCsv` (type: `string`):

Auction records as CSV.

## `summary` (type: `string`):

Counts, warnings, and access diagnostics.

## `consoleRun` (type: `string`):

Live run status, logs, and dataset preview.

# API

You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.

## JavaScript example

```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
    token: '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>',
});

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {
    "startUrls": [
        {
            "url": "https://carsandbids.com/search/honda"
        }
    ]
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("muhammadafzal/cars-and-bids-scraper").call(input);

// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.dir(item);
});

// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs

```

## Python example

```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient

# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_API_TOKEN>")

# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = { "startUrls": [{ "url": "https://carsandbids.com/search/honda" }] }

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("muhammadafzal/cars-and-bids-scraper").call(run_input=run_input)

# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print(f"💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}")
for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items():
    print(item)

# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start

```

## CLI example

```bash
echo '{
  "startUrls": [
    {
      "url": "https://carsandbids.com/search/honda"
    }
  ]
}' |
apify call muhammadafzal/cars-and-bids-scraper --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,muhammadafzal/cars-and-bids-scraper"
        }
    }
}

```

The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer <APIFY_API_TOKEN>` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations).

## OpenAPI specification

Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/dGTgVngkBB0i5CDtc/builds/pPYaiPTSxj3PzXI9V/openapi.json