Douyin Live Hot Search List Scraper

EN — Get the current Douyin LIVE hot search list. Returns the trending keywords driving the most LIVE stream traffic right now. Each item includes rank, keyword (word), live heat score, cover image, live room count, and metadata. One run = one snapshot.

ZH — 抖音直播热搜榜 — 当前直播频道热门搜索词一键抓取。 每条含排名、关键词、直播热度值、封面、关联直播间数、事件时间。一次运行 = 一个快照。

Built for live commerce ops, live-stream talent scouting, real-time trend monitoring, and competitive live-intel on Douyin — the dominant live-streaming platform in China.

5 free runs / day. No API key required — the Actor's built-in upstream key is already configured.

Input

No input is required. The endpoint returns the current LIVE hot search list snapshot directly.

{}

Output

The Actor pushes one item per live trending keyword to the default dataset and writes a SUMMARY record.

{
  "rank": 1,
  "word": "主播挑战赛",
  "hot_value": 12345678,
  "group_id": "g_live_001",
  "sentence_id": "s_live_001",
  "sentence_tag": 2110,
  "video_count": 12,
  "discuss_video_count": 3,
  "article_detail_count": 1,
  "event_time": 1789107600,
  "cover_url": "https://p11-sign.douyinpic.com/live_cover1.jpeg",
  "hotlist_param": "{\"board_type\":6,\"rank\":0}",
  "rawData": { /* full upstream trending_list item */ }
}

SUMMARY record (success):

{
  "ok": true,
  "requests": 1,
  "uniqueItems": 30,
  "activeTime": "2026-09-10 23:00",
  "note": "1 Run = 1 upstream request. Returns the current Douyin LIVE hot search list snapshot."
}

SUMMARY record (upstream error — ok: false):

If the upstream endpoint is unhealthy, the Actor writes the error to SUMMARY and pushes a single { ok: false, error } item to the dataset so users see exactly why the run returned zero items. No credits are consumed on the upstream side.

{
  "ok": false,
  "error": "Upstream request failed (HTTP 400): Request failed. Please retry. ...",
  "requests": 0,
  "uniqueItems": 0,
  "note": "Upstream returned an error. The run did not consume credits (per upstream message)."
}

Known upstream status

The live hot search endpoint has been returning transient HTTP 400 errors with the message Request failed. Please retry (verified 2026-09-11). The upstream explicitly states You won't be charged for this request. The Actor treats these 4xx responses as non-retryable so users don't burn through the free quota waiting on a sick endpoint.

If your run returns ok: false, retry in a few minutes — the upstream usually recovers within an hour.

Use it together with the other Douyin Actors

This Actor is part of the 5-Actor Douyin MVP set. Use it together with:

Where in the pipeline	Actor	Use it to
you are here	Douyin Live Hot Search List Scraper (you are here)	(this Actor)
hashtag pipeline — before / step ①	../douyin-hashtag-search/README.md	if a live trend looks interesting, search it as a keyword to get the ch_id
hashtag pipeline — step ②	../douyin-hashtag-detail/README.md	follow up on a discovered topic with rich ch_info
hashtag pipeline — step ③	../douyin-hashtag-video-list/README.md	walk the full video list of the discovered topic
sister Actor	../douyin-hot-search-list/README.md	compare LIVE vs mainstream trends — see what is about to break into 热点榜

You are here: Douyin Live Hot Search List Scraper — run this on its own for the upstream use case described above, or chain it with the other 4 Actors for a full Douyin keyword → hashtag → videos → trends pipeline.

Use cases

Persona	Use it for
Live commerce ops	Catch rising live-stream keywords before they hit 热点榜 and grab first-mover ad placement
Live-stream talent scout	Find keywords with high video_count to spot live rooms gaining traction
Real-time trend dashboard	Wire this Actor into a 5-minute cron alongside douyin-hot-search-list to compare live vs. top-hot trends
Competitive live intel	See which verticals (food / fashion / gaming) are getting live-stream traction today

Why this Actor exists

Douyin's LIVE channel is where creators monetize. Hot search keywords there are 30-90 minutes ahead of the main 热点榜, so brands that act on live trends first get the cheapest reach. This Actor is the step ④ of the 4-Actor Douyin MVP set — pair it with the regular hot search list to see what's about to break into mainstream.

Pricing

Free users are limited to 5 runs per day. Paid users (APIFY_USER_IS_PAYING=1) have unlimited runs. The Actor itself adds no markup — you pay the upstream provider per request plus the standard Apify compute unit cost.

Test locally

cd douyin-live-hot-search-list
UPSTREAM_API_KEY=... UPSTREAM_BASE_URL=<your-upstream-base-url> npm test

• node test/unit.js — 5 unit assertions on normalize / extract / empty-payload handling.
• node test/integration.js — 1 live call; gracefully skips when the upstream returns 4xx (transient upstream issue, not a code bug).

Output schema

See .actor/output_schema.json for the full type schema, or read it at runtime via the Apify API.

License

MIT