Y Combinator Scraper: YC Companies, Founders & Email Pattern

Scrape the Y Combinator startup directory (YC companies list): companies, founders and open jobs, with each company's website, domain, LinkedIn, team size, batch and location, founders' LinkedIn, bio and past companies, job salaries and hiring managers, and the company's email pattern (first.last@, first@…) worked out from emails the company really published, plus a DNS MX check. Latin America by default; any region, batch, industry or tag.

Built for people who reach out to startups: developers looking for a job, recruiters, founders looking for peers, sales, lead generation and partnerships teams. Export YC startups, YC founders and YC jobs (the same roles as Work at a Startup) to JSON, CSV or Excel, or call it as an API.

No login, no cookies, no browser: the actor reads only public pages, so runs are fast and cheap.

What you get

One run produces one type of row (outputType):

Output	One row is	Typical use
companies (default)	A YC company with its founders and jobs inside	Build a target list of startups
founders	One founder, with the company's domain, size and location	Write to the decision maker
jobs	One open role, with salary, hiring manager and the company's founders	Apply where you fit

Every row includes the company domain. With inferEmailPattern (on by default) it also includes the emailPattern block: the pattern, a confidence score, the evidence it is based on, alternatives, MX servers and the email provider (Google Workspace, Microsoft 365…), and an email candidate for every founder and hiring manager.

Measured coverage (1 Oct 2026)

The public directory lists 6,267 companies; 221 in Latin America (Mexico 86, Brazil 51, Colombia 31, Argentina 21, Chile 20, Peru 10) and 1,487 hiring worldwide (18 in Latin America).

Fill rates measured in this actor's own output (80 Latin American companies with details, 80 founders, 60 jobs):

Field	Latin America	Notes
Website and domain	100%
Company LinkedIn	93.8%
Founders listed	98.8% of companies	2.3 founders per company
Founder LinkedIn	99.4% of founders
Founder bio	93.9%
Founder past companies	48.3%	From Work at a Startup
Company X/Twitter, Crunchbase	48.8%, 48.8%
GitHub organization	11.3%
Hiring and tech descriptions	40%, 32.5%
Emails the company published	25%	Launch posts, descriptions
Email pattern backed by evidence	7.5% (6 of 80)	12% on 1,000 companies worldwide
Domain with valid MX	92.5%	87.5% use Google Workspace
Email candidate per founder	91.1%	Most are inferred (see FAQ)
Jobs: full description and hiring manager	100%	When the job page is read
Jobs: numeric salary	95% (Latin America), 70% (Remote)

Wider sample from the source itself (310 companies): company LinkedIn 88.1%, team size 99.7%, year founded 94.5%, news coverage 47.4%, Launch posts 23.5%, open jobs 30% of companies.

Speed and cost (measured on the Apify platform, 2 Oct 2026)

All runs at the default 512 MB memory, from Apify's own servers, without proxy. 0 of 2,177 requests blocked or rate limited across 14 runs.

Input	Rows	Time	Peak memory	You pay
{} (default: 50 Latin American companies with founders and jobs)	50	10 s	78 MB	$0.45 (50 × $0.008 + 5 patterns × $0.01)
{"outputType": "founders", "maxItems": 40}	40	6 s	63 MB	$0.19 (40 × $0.004 + 3 patterns)
{"outputType": "jobs", "maxItems": 30} (with job descriptions)	30	8 s	67 MB	$0.18 (30 × $0.006)
{"outputType": "jobs", "regions": ["Remote", "Fully Remote"], "includeJobDetails": false, "maxItems": 30}	30	5 s	65 MB	$0.09 (30 × $0.003)
Directory only (includeFounders and includeJobs off), batch Winter 2024, 40 rows	40	3 s	55 MB	$0.12 (40 × $0.003)
Whole directory, "regions": [], "maxItems": 500	500	83 s	132 MB	$4.38 (500 × $0.008 + 38 patterns)
Founders, whole directory, maxItems 300 with a $0.50 spending limit	109	10 s	66 MB	$0.496 (109 × $0.004 + 6 patterns): stopped cleanly at the limit

Earlier local tests: 1,000 companies with details in 74 s (peak 183 MB) and 2,500 directory-only rows in 18 s, so the default 512 MB is plenty.

Pricing (pay per event)

Event	Price	When
Actor start	$0.00001	Once per run
Company (directory data)	$0.003	Company row without its page (founders and jobs off)
Company (with founders and jobs)	$0.008	Company row with its page read (default)
Founder	$0.004	One founder row
Job posting	$0.003	One job row from the company page
Job posting with full description	$0.006	One job row with its job page read
Company email pattern	$0.01	Once per domain, only when backed by an observed email

Each row is charged one row event (by depth, never added up) and at most one email pattern per domain. A pattern that is only a guess (no evidence) is free and marked inferred: true. Error rows are never charged. Example: the default run (50 Latin American companies with details) cost $0.45 on 2 Oct 2026 (50 × $0.008 + 5 evidence-backed patterns × $0.01). See the table above for more measured examples.

You want	Approximate cost
100 YC companies with founders and jobs	$0.80 + about $0.08 of email patterns (7.6% of domains had evidence in the 500-company run)
1,000 YC founders	$4.00 + email patterns
1,000 YC jobs with full description	$6.00
The whole directory, directory data only (6,268 companies)	about $18.80

Input

Field	Default	What it does
outputType	companies	companies, founders or jobs
regions	["Latin America"]	YC region tags; empty = whole directory
query		Free text, as in the directory search box
batches		Winter 2024 or W24, S25, F24, X25 (Spring)
industries, tags, status, stages		Optional filters
onlyHiring, topCompaniesOnly	false	Only hiring companies / only YC top companies
minTeamSize, maxTeamSize		Team size range
sortBy	relevance	Or launchDate (newest first)
includeFounders, includeJobs	true	Companies output: open the company page
includeJobDetails	true	Jobs output: open each job page
inferEmailPattern	true	Email pattern, MX check and email candidates
includePersonalEmails	false	Keep gmail/outlook/yahoo-style addresses
includeEuPersons	false	Include people of EU/EEA/UK/Swiss companies
maxItems	50	Rows to deliver (and charge)
maxConcurrency	4	Company pages read at the same time (1 to 8)

Input examples

Fintech startups in Mexico, with founders and jobs:

{ "outputType": "companies", "regions": ["Mexico"], "industries": ["Fintech"], "maxItems": 100 }

Founders of the latest YC batch, worldwide:

{ "outputType": "founders", "regions": [], "batches": ["Fall 2026"], "maxItems": 250 }

Remote jobs at YC AI startups that are hiring, newest companies first:

{ "outputType": "jobs", "regions": ["Remote", "Fully Remote"], "tags": ["Artificial Intelligence"], "onlyHiring": true, "sortBy": "launchDate", "maxItems": 200 }

Output examples

A real company row from the default run on the Apify platform (2 Oct 2026), shortened. Founder details are left out here; in your dataset each founder has name, title, bio, LinkedIn, X, past companies and an email candidate.

{
  "rowType": "company",
  "companyId": 755,
  "name": "Bright",
  "url": "https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/bright",
  "website": "https://www.thinkbright.mx/",
  "domain": "thinkbright.mx",
  "oneLiner": "Sunrun for the developing world",
  "batch": "Winter 2015",
  "batchCode": "W15",
  "status": "Active",
  "stage": "Growth",
  "teamSize": 100,
  "industry": "Industrials",
  "industries": ["Industrials", "Energy"],
  "tags": ["Fintech", "Solar Power", "Climate"],
  "regions": ["United States of America", "Mexico", "America / Canada", "Latin America", "Remote", "Fully Remote"],
  "location": "New York City, NY",
  "country": "US",
  "yearFounded": 2014,
  "linkedinUrl": "https://www.linkedin.com/company/9506733/",
  "crunchbaseUrl": "https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/bright-3",
  "newsItems": [{ "title": "Bright raises $32M  to expand rooftop solar in Mexico", "url": "https://www.axios.com/pro/climate-deals/2023/07/27/bright-31-million-jonah-greenberger-sdg-ifu-solar-mexico", "date": "Jul 27, 2023" }],
  "foundersCount": 1,
  "founders": ["…"],
  "jobsCount": 0,
  "waasUrl": "https://www.workatastartup.com/companies/bright",
  "emailPattern": {
    "domain": "thinkbright.mx",
    "pattern": "first.last",
    "confidence": 0.1,
    "inferred": true,
    "evidenceCount": 0,
    "mxValid": true,
    "mxHosts": ["aspmx.l.google.com", "alt1.aspmx.l.google.com"],
    "emailProvider": "Google Workspace",
    "catchAll": null,
    "billable": false
  },
  "detailFetched": true
}

This company published no email, so the pattern is a free guess (inferred: true, billable: false). When the company did publish emails, the block also lists the evidence and inferred is false, as in the example below.

The next examples use fictitious data, to show every field of a person without publishing a real one.

A company row with an evidence-backed pattern (outputType: companies), shortened:

{
  "rowType": "company",
  "companyId": 30001,
  "name": "Acme Pay",
  "url": "https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/acme-pay",
  "website": "https://acmepay.example.com",
  "domain": "acmepay.example.com",
  "oneLiner": "Payments infrastructure for Latin America",
  "batch": "Winter 2025",
  "batchCode": "W25",
  "status": "Active",
  "isHiring": true,
  "teamSize": 12,
  "location": "Mexico City, Mexico",
  "country": "MX",
  "industries": ["Fintech", "Payments"],
  "linkedinUrl": "https://www.linkedin.com/company/acme-pay-example",
  "founders": [
    {
      "fullName": "Ana Example",
      "title": "Founder/CEO",
      "linkedinUrl": "https://www.linkedin.com/in/ana-example",
      "pastCompanies": "Engineer at Example Corp",
      "emailCandidate": "ana@acmepay.example.com",
      "emailCandidateConfidence": 0.75,
      "emailCandidateInferred": false
    }
  ],
  "jobs": [
    { "jobId": 70001, "title": "Senior Backend Engineer", "location": "Remote (MX; CO)", "remote": true, "salaryMin": 60000, "salaryMax": 90000, "salaryCurrency": "USD" }
  ],
  "contactEmails": ["ana@acmepay.example.com", "hello@acmepay.example.com"],
  "emailPattern": {
    "pattern": "first",
    "example": "first@acmepay.example.com",
    "confidence": 0.75,
    "inferred": false,
    "evidenceCount": 2,
    "evidence": [{ "email": "ana@acmepay.example.com", "kind": "known-person-match", "matchedPatterns": ["first"], "source": "launch" }],
    "mxValid": true,
    "emailProvider": "Google Workspace",
    "catchAll": null
  },
  "detailFetched": true
}

A founder row (outputType: founders):

{
  "rowType": "founder",
  "founderKey": "30001:900001",
  "fullName": "Ana Example",
  "title": "Founder/CEO",
  "linkedinUrl": "https://www.linkedin.com/in/ana-example",
  "bio": "Second-time founder, ex payments engineer.",
  "latestYcCompany": { "name": "Acme Pay", "url": "https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/acme-pay" },
  "emailCandidate": "ana@acmepay.example.com",
  "emailCandidateConfidence": 0.75,
  "emailCandidateInferred": false,
  "companyName": "Acme Pay",
  "domain": "acmepay.example.com",
  "batch": "Winter 2025",
  "teamSize": 12,
  "country": "MX",
  "isHiring": true
}

A job row (outputType: jobs, fictitious; real job rows also carry the full description, interview process, office and applicant locations and the company's founders):

{
  "rowType": "job",
  "jobId": 70001,
  "title": "Senior Backend Engineer",
  "url": "https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/acme-pay/jobs/abc123-senior-backend-engineer",
  "location": "Remote (MX; CO)",
  "remote": true,
  "type": "Full-time",
  "prettyRole": "Engineering",
  "salaryMin": 60000,
  "salaryMax": 90000,
  "salaryCurrency": "USD",
  "visa": "Will sponsor",
  "datePosted": "2026-09-12",
  "hiringManager": { "fullName": "Ana Example", "emailCandidate": "ana@acmepay.example.com", "emailCandidateConfidence": 0.75 },
  "companyName": "Acme Pay",
  "domain": "acmepay.example.com"
}

How the email pattern works

1. The actor collects every email the company itself published on its YC pages (Launch posts, descriptions, hiring text, job descriptions).
2. It matches them against the founders' and hiring managers' names to find the format (23 patterns: first, first.last, flast, firstlast, last…).
3. Confidence grows with evidence: one matching email gives 0.5, two give 0.75, three give 0.88. Without a valid MX record the confidence is halved.
4. It checks the domain's mail servers by DNS (MX) and names the provider. It never connects to a mail server (no SMTP probing), so catchAll is always null.
5. With no evidence, it gives the most common format measured for the provider (first.last@ in most cases), marked inferred: true with confidence 0.05 to 0.10. That guess is free.

Privacy

• Emails at personal domains (gmail.com, outlook.com, yahoo.com and similar) are removed everywhere, including inside descriptions, unless you enable includePersonalEmails.
• For companies based in the EU, EEA, UK or Switzerland, founder and hiring manager names, bios, links, photos and email candidates are withheld (personalDataWithheld: true on company and job rows; with outputType: founders those founders are skipped) unless you enable includeEuPersons. If you enable it, you are responsible for having a lawful basis under GDPR.
• Image links are delivered without their temporary signature. Video links are not delivered at all (they only work with a temporary signed link).
• The actor never logs in, never creates accounts and never solves CAPTCHAs. It only reads public pages.

FAQ

Are the email candidates verified? No. They are built from the company's pattern. When emailCandidateInferred is false, the pattern comes from real emails the company published; when it is true, it is a guess. Check emailCandidateConfidence before you write, and never send bulk email.

Why is the founder's email not included directly? YC does not publish founder emails. The profile only says that an email exists (hasEmail).

Can I get every YC company? Yes. Leave regions empty and set maxItems up to 10,000. The directory search reaches 1,000 results per query, so the actor splits large searches by YC batch automatically (measured: 6,267 of 6,267 reachable).

Why do some jobs have no numeric salary? The company did not list one. When the job page is read, the actor uses the structured salary the page provides; otherwise it parses the listed range (for example "$84K - $120K").

Does it apply to jobs for me? No. It only reads public data. applyUrl takes you to YC's own application page.

What happens if I set a spending limit? The run stops cleanly when the next row would exceed it. Within a run, every delivered row is charged once and nothing is charged twice, also when the platform resumes the run after a migration. Separate runs are independent: a company delivered by two runs is charged in each.

Do I need a proxy? No. On 2 Oct 2026, 2,177 requests from Apify's servers got 0 blocks and 0 rate limits. If the site ever starts blocking, the actor switches to a fresh session by itself.

Can I run it on a schedule? Yes. Save your input as a task and schedule it daily or weekly to catch new YC companies, new founders and new jobs (sort by launchDate to see the newest first).

What does a run with no results mean? Your filters matched no companies. The run ends successfully with one explanatory error row; no row is charged (only the $0.00001 actor start event).

Support

Questions, a field you need, or a removal request: use the Issues tab of this actor.