Instagram Following Scraper — Following, Related, Enriched

You paste one username. You get who they follow — or Instagram's own suggested similar accounts — with optional full profile enrichment on every account.

Free tier — 3 results free on every run

The free results waive this Actor's own fee; the source Actor (publicsignallabs/instagram-following) still bills its own price for every row it returns.

The first 3 results of every run are free, on every run you ever make — not a one-off trial. One guard: the free allowance never covers more than half of a run, so the offer stays sustainable.

Compared with instagram-scraper/instagram-related-profiles

Read on the Store on 2026-10-23 (instagram-scraper/instagram-related-profiles). Where it does better, this section says so.

• Data source: this Actor runs publicsignallabs/instagram-following for you, then cleans and checks every row.
• This Actor's fee is free on the first results of every run, and a hard cost cap (maxTotalChargeUsd) limits it.
• Price: about $2.5 per 1,000 in total here ($2 for this Actor + $0.5 for publicsignallabs/instagram-following), $2.5 at instagram-scraper/instagram-related-profiles.

Why this, not another following scraper

The category leader has 242 clients and a 3.56/5 rating, driven by 7.4% failure. This Actor scopes each listed account independently and never bills a failed one — same discipline as the rest of this family.

5 advantages

1. Two honest modes, not a fragile third. following and related both work reliably. We tested a followers mode extensively and cut it — it silently returned nothing on every real account we tried, so we are not shipping something that doesn't work.
2. Related accounts, for free. related mode uses Instagram's own similar-accounts suggestions — no extra scrape.
3. Optional enrichment, same engine as our Profile Scraper. Turn on enrichProfiles and every listed account gets followers, engagement, and bio contact — the exact same fields, same price.
4. Never billed on a failed lookup.
5. Hard cost cap you control. Set maxTotalChargeUsd and the run can never bill above it.

Output

A real row from this Actor's latest run on Apify (2026-10-25; long texts are cut and people's names hidden here, your dataset has them in full):

{
  "status": "ok",
  "username": "(hidden here)",
  "profile_url": "https://www.instagram.com/mikemcgovern/",
  "full_name": "(hidden here)",
  "is_verified": true,
  "is_private": false,
  "user_id": "(hidden here)",
  "profile_pic_url": "(hidden here)",
  "enriched": false
}

Every field

Field	What it holds
status	status
username	handle of a followed account
profile_url	profile link
full_name	full name
is_verified	is verified
is_private	is private
user_id	user id
profile_pic_url	profile pic url
enriched	profile details (followers, bio, category...) when you turn enrichment on

Pricing

• Source Actor charge: this Actor runs publicsignallabs/instagram-following inside your run, and Apify bills that run to your account at publicsignallabs/instagram-following's own price (about $0.5 per 1,000 results, read on 2026-10-23), on top of this Actor's price. Each call to it is capped at $0.05. Pay per event, base FREE-tier price: $0.002 per account listed and $0.004 per enriched profile until 24 November 2026; from 25 November 2026: $0.00005 per account listed and $0.00115 per enriched profile.

Profile enrichment is on: turn on enrichProfiles for followers, engagement and bio contact (up to 25 profiles per run, same price on every plan). Paid Store plans pay less per account listed (down to $0.0011 on the largest plans); the enrichment price is the same on every plan. The Pricing tab on this Actor's Store page is always the authority. No event is ever charged on an item that returns an error — a batch of 200 with one bad input bills 199.

Use it from an AI agent (MCP and x402)

Connect Claude Desktop, Cursor, VS Code or any MCP client to Apify's MCP server at https://mcp.apify.com and add this Actor, om_kh/instagram-following-scraper, as a tool — the agent passes the same JSON as the run input and gets the dataset back.

AI agents that pay with x402 can run it too, without an Apify account: the Actor charges only per result delivered, so an agent pays exactly for what it gets.

Related Actors

• Instagram Lookalike Scraper - Similar Accounts, Followers, Bio — full profile detail and related-account discovery
• TikTok Creator Search Scraper — cross-platform creator research on TikTok

How to use it in 3 steps

1. Click Try for free and enter an Instagram username or profile URL.
2. Choose mode: following (accounts the profile follows) or related (Instagram's own similar-accounts suggestions). Turn on enrichProfiles to add followers, engagement and bio contact.
3. Click Start and export the accounts as JSON, CSV or Excel.

Use cases

• Influencer discovery — the accounts a creator follows are often their peers and collaborators.
• Competitor research — see which brands, suppliers and partners a competitor follows.
• Audience mapping — build a niche list from one seed account.
• Outreach lists — enrich each account with bio contact data.

Use it from code (API)

Every Apify Actor is an API. Start a run and read the results with one call.

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>")
run = client.actor("om_kh/instagram-following-scraper").call(run_input={"username": "natgeo", "mode": "following", "maxResults": 50, "enrichProfiles": False})
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item)

JavaScript

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: '<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>' });
const run = await client.actor('om_kh/instagram-following-scraper').call({
    "username": "natgeo",
    "mode": "following",
    "maxResults": 50,
    "enrichProfiles": false
});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

One HTTP call (cURL) — runs the Actor and returns the dataset in the same response:

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/om_kh~instagram-following-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"username": "natgeo", "mode": "following", "maxResults": 50, "enrichProfiles": false}'

Integrations: n8n, Make, Zapier, Google Sheets

• n8n — the official Apify node, operation Run Actor and get dataset, Actor om_kh/instagram-following-scraper.
• Make — Apify › Run an Actor, then Apify › Get Dataset Items.
• Zapier — Apify › Run Actor; map the dataset items into your next step.
• Google Sheets, webhooks, Slack — add an integration from the Integrations tab of this Actor.
• Schedules — run it every hour or day from Schedules in Apify Console.

Example input

{
  "username": "natgeo"
}

FAQ

Do I need an Instagram account or cookies? No. It uses public profile data only and never logs in.

Does it work on private profiles? No — private profiles do not expose who they follow. They are reported with an error and not charged.

What is the related mode? Instagram's own "suggested for you" similar accounts for a profile — a fast way to find lookalikes.

Is it legal? It collects public profile information only. If you store personal data, you are responsible for GDPR and similar rules.

How many accounts can I get? Set maxResults; you pay per account listed, and the run stops at your maxTotalChargeUsd.

Your feedback

Did this Actor save you time? A short review on the Reviews tab helps other people find it, and every review is read. Something missing or broken? Open an issue on the Issues tab: it is answered and fixed fast.

More Actors from the same author

• Instagram Lookalike Scraper - Similar Accounts, Followers, Bio — similar accounts to any profile, with metrics
• YouTube Creator Lead Finder - Views, Niche, Email — creators on YouTube with contact signals
• TikTok Creator Search Scraper — creators on TikTok by keyword

Support

Found a bug or have a feature request? Use the Issues tab on this Actor's Apify Store page, or message the author (om_kh) directly.