🚚 FMCSA Carrier Scraper

Search US trucking carriers and brokers from the official FMCSA / DOT open data with no API key. Filter 2M+ carriers by state, cargo, fleet size, operation class, safety rating and registration date for a clean B2B lead list, then enrich every row with CSA / SMS BASIC safety scores, the full authority and insurance history (grants, revocations, reinstatements, coverage amounts, lapses), crashes, roadside inspections and out-of-service orders. Run a lifecycle-change monitor for daily alerts, or pull a complete safety profile for a list of carriers.

Here is one real row (trimmed), for an established carrier with safety + history on:

{
  "dot_number": "370617",
  "mc_numbers": ["MC386188"],
  "legal_name": "JFC INTERNATIONAL INC",
  "entity_type": "carrier",
  "status": "active",
  "operation_class": "Interstate",
  "hazmat": false,
  "registration_date": "1998-06-11",
  "phone": "3105551234",
  "email": "dispatch@example.com",
  "officer_1": "...",
  "physical_address": "...  LOS ANGELES, CA, 90001",
  "physical_state": "CA",
  "power_units": 210,
  "drivers_total": 190,
  "cargo_carried": ["General Freight", "Refrigerated Food"],
  "safety_rating": "C",
  "safety_rating_label": "Conditional",
  "prior_authority_revocation": false,
  "out_of_service": false,
  "safety_scores": {
    "inspections_total": 506,
    "driver_oos_rate": 0.041,
    "vehicle_oos_rate": 0.19,
    "any_basic_alert": false,
    "basics": {
      "vehicle_maintenance": { "measure": 3.21, "alert": false },
      "hours_of_service": { "measure": 1.08, "alert": false }
    }
  },
  "authority_granted": true,
  "authority_revoked": false,
  "authority_types": ["MOTOR PROPERTY COMMON CARRIER", "MOTOR PROPERTY CONTRACT CARRIER"],
  "last_authority_action": "REINSTATED",
  "last_authority_action_date": "2019-04-02",
  "insurance_on_file": true,
  "current_insurer": "TOKIO MARINE AMERICA INSURANCE COMPANY",
  "liability_coverage_thousands": 750,
  "last_cancellation_date": "2023-06-30",
  "crashes_total": 122,
  "crashes_24mo": 8,
  "inspections_24mo": 514,
  "oos_rate_24mo": 0.093,
  "safer_url": "https://safer.fmcsa.dot.gov/query.asp?searchtype=ANY&query_type=queryCarrierSnapshot&query_param=USDOT&query_string=370617",
  "scraped_at": "2026-09-10T14:09:24.000Z"
}

What it does

Reads the FMCSA datasets published on data.transportation.gov (Socrata, keyless, updated daily): the carrier census, the SMS BASIC safety measures, authority and insurance history, the crash and inspection files, and out-of-service orders. It joins them by USDOT and MC docket number. Four modes:

• Search - filter the census for a lead list, then batch-enrich every match.
• Look up - resolve exact USDOT numbers, MC/MX docket numbers or company names. One row per identifier; ids that do not resolve come back as an error row.
• Monitor - carriers with a new registration, authority revocation, reinstatement, insurance lapse or out-of-service order since a date, each tagged with the change type.
• Safety - the full safety profile (CSA BASIC scores, authority + insurance history, 24-month inspection and crash detail) for the carriers you name.

Why this scraper

• CSA / SMS BASIC safety scores. The seven Behavior Analysis categories with their raw measures and above-threshold alert flags, plus driver and vehicle out-of-service rates. No other FMCSA Actor on Apify parses these - they stop at the census snapshot.
• Authority lifecycle, not just current status. Every grant, involuntary revocation and reinstatement with dates - so you can see a carrier that has been revoked three times, or one reinstated last week.
• Insurance history with coverage and lapses. Current insurer and liability limit, plus every past filing with its cancellation date - the signal an underwriter or a factoring company actually acts on.
• Crash and inspection detail. 24-month crash counts (fatal / injury / tow) and inspection out-of-service rates, computed from the crash and inspection files, not just a headline number.
• A real change monitor. Not "USDOT numbers not seen before" - an actual lifecycle feed: revocations, lapses and out-of-service orders are the events worth a phone call.
• Fast. Every source is a keyless JSON API and every enrichment is one batched query per dataset (dot_number IN (...)), not one request per carrier. A 2,000-carrier run with CSA scores, authority and insurance history takes about 2 seconds; the census pagination is the only real cost.
• No API key. The DOT open data is free; a Socrata app token is optional and only for very large runs.

How it compares

Capability	This actor	Other FMCSA scrapers on Apify
Census: identity, contact, officers, fleet, cargo	yes	yes
Filter by state / cargo / fleet size / registration date	yes	some
CSA / SMS BASIC safety scores + alert flags	yes	no
Authority history (grants / revocations / reinstatements)	yes	current status only
Insurance history (insurer, coverage, lapses)	yes	current only, if any
24-month crash + inspection out-of-service detail	yes	counts only
Lifecycle-change monitor (revocations, lapses, OOS)	yes	new-carrier delta only
One row per look-up input, error rows for bad ids	yes	rare
Declared dataset schema + free-plan preview	yes	rare

Use cases

• Freight-broker prospecting. New interstate carriers in your lanes, with phone, email and officer names, the day their authority is granted.
• Insurance underwriting. Pull a carrier's CSA BASIC alerts, out-of-service rate, crash history and every past insurance cancellation before you quote.
• Factoring / risk. Monitor mode on insurance_lapse and revocation - a lapse is a carrier to call, a revocation is one to stop funding.
• Equipment / ELD / fuel-card sales. Filter by fleet size and cargo type, keep the officers and contact.
• Compliance benchmarking. Rank a set of carriers on OOS rate and BASIC scores.

Quickstart

Search - new interstate reefer carriers in Texas, 5-50 trucks:

{
  "mode": "search",
  "state": ["TX"],
  "operationClass": "interstate",
  "cargo": ["coldfood"],
  "minPowerUnits": 5,
  "maxPowerUnits": 50,
  "registeredAfter": "2026-06-01",
  "includeSafety": true,
  "maxItems": 500
}

Look up a batch:

{ "mode": "lookup", "identifiers": ["76830", "MC386188", "SWIFT TRANSPORTATION"], "includeHistory": true }

Monitor lifecycle changes in the last week:

{ "mode": "monitor", "since": "7 days", "events": ["revocation", "insurance_lapse", "oos_order"], "maxItems": 1000 }

Full safety profile:

{ "mode": "safety", "identifiers": ["370617", "593107"] }

Input reference

Field	Applies to	Description
maxItems	all	Ceiling on rows written.
mode	all	search, lookup, monitor or safety.
state	search, monitor	Two-letter physical state code(s).
operationClass	search, monitor	interstate, intrastate, intrastate_hazmat.
cargo	search, monitor	Commodity types (genfreight, coldfood, chem, ...).
hazmatOnly	search, monitor	Only hazmat-flagged carriers.
safetyRating	search	S, C or U.
minPowerUnits / maxPowerUnits	search	Fleet-size range.
registeredAfter / registeredBefore	search	Registration-date window (ISO).
keyword	search	Legal or DBA name contains.
activeOnly	search, monitor	Exclude de-registered carriers (default on).
identifiers	lookup, safety	USDOT numbers, MC/MX numbers, or company names.
since	monitor	ISO date or "7 days" / "2 weeks".
events	monitor	new_registration, revocation, reinstatement, insurance_lapse, oos_order.
includeSafety	search, lookup	CSA BASIC scores + inspection/crash summary. Default on.
includeHistory	search, lookup	Authority + insurance history. Billed separately.
includeInspections	search, lookup	Per-inspection + per-crash detail. Billed separately.
socrataAppToken	all	Optional free token for large runs.

Output reference (selected)

Field	Description
dot_number / mc_numbers / legal_name / dba_name	Identity.
status / entity_type / operation_class / business_type / hazmat	Classification.
registration_date / mcs150_date	Dates.
phone / cell_phone / email / officer_1 / officer_2	Contact.
physical_address / mailing_address / address_undeliverable	Addresses.
power_units / truck_units / drivers_total / drivers_cdl / cargo_carried	Fleet and cargo.
safety_rating / safety_rating_label / recordable_crash_rate / prior_authority_revocation	Headline safety.
out_of_service / out_of_service_date / out_of_service_reason	Current OOS order.
safety_scores	CSA BASIC measures + alerts + OOS rates (with includeSafety).
authority_granted / authority_revoked / authority_types / last_authority_action / authority_history	Authority lifecycle (with includeHistory).
insurance_on_file / current_insurer / liability_coverage_thousands / last_cancellation_date / insurance_history	Insurance (with includeHistory).
crashes_24mo / fatal_crashes_24mo / inspections_24mo / oos_rate_24mo	24-month safety detail.
change_type	Monitor mode: new_registration, revocation, insurance_lapse, oos_order.
query / error	Set on an unresolved look-up id row.
safer_url	The carrier's SAFER company snapshot page.
scraped_at	ISO 8601 collection timestamp.

Run via API and CLI

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/USERNAME~fmcsa-carrier-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=<TOKEN>" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"mode":"lookup","identifiers":["76830"],"includeHistory":true}'

$apify call USERNAME/fmcsa-carrier-scraper --input '{"mode":"monitor","since":"7 days","events":["revocation"]}'

Fetch results

$curl "https://api.apify.com/v2/datasets/<DATASET_ID>/items?token=<TOKEN>&clean=true&format=csv"

Billing and limits

• Pay per result. Billed per carrier row written. includeSafety, includeHistory and includeInspections each add a separate event, charged only when that enrichment produced data.
• No charge on failure. A run that produces zero rows fails with a message and is not billed.
• An unresolved look-up id still writes one error: "not found" row and is billed as a base row.
• Free Apify plans run the built-in 10-row sample only.
• The DOT open-data API caps a single query at 50,000 rows; this Actor pages the census in 2,000-row chunks and batches enrichment lookups, so throughput is roughly 1,000 fully enriched carriers per second - the census pagination is the bottleneck, not the enrichment.
• Very large runs can supply a free data.transportation.gov app token to raise the shared rate limit.

FAQ

Do I need an API key? No. data.transportation.gov is a keyless open-data host. A Socrata app token is optional and only helps on very large runs.

Why is a carrier's safety_rating blank? Most carriers have never had a compliance review, so they carry no rating. That is normal, not missing data.

What does authority_revoked: true mean? There is an involuntary revocation on record with no matching reinstatement. Carriers are routinely revoked for a lapsed insurance filing and reinstated within days - those show authority_revoked: false with the cycle in authority_history.

How fresh is the data? The census and most datasets update daily from a database that is about 24 hours behind live. It is not real-time.

Is this an official FMCSA tool? No. Independent, not affiliated with FMCSA or the US DOT. It reads only data they publish as open data.

Local development

bun install
bun test              # offline: normalisation + input logic
bun run src/main.ts   # reads storage/key_value_stores/default/INPUT.json
bun scripts/verify-live.mjs   # hits data.transportation.gov directly, checks every mode