🏔️ Alpine Linux Packages Scraper

🚀 Turn the Alpine Linux package index into clean, structured records. Query pkgs.alpinelinux.org by name, branch, repository, and architecture and get version, license, maintainer, and dependency data per package.

🕒 Last updated: 2026-07-14 · 📊 Up to 21 fields per record · 10 branches · 9 architectures · main, community, and testing repos

Pull the official Alpine Linux package database straight from pkgs.alpinelinux.org and drop it into a spreadsheet, a database, or your own tooling. Filter with a glob on the package name, pick a release branch, narrow to a repository and architecture, and get one clean record per package with the metadata that matters: version, license, maintainer, project link, and build date.

Coverage is the live Alpine package index as the site publishes it: the rolling edge branch plus the stable v3.x releases, across main, community, and testing repositories and every supported CPU architecture. Turn on dependency enrichment and each package also carries its description, install size, origin, commit hash, build time, and full depends, provides, and sub package lists.

🎯 Target Audience	💡 Primary Use Cases
Security and DevSecOps teams	Audit versions and licenses, track CVEs
Platform and container engineers	Pin base image packages, build SBOMs
Distro maintainers and packagers	Watch versions across branches
Mirror and tooling operators	Snapshot the index for offline use

📋 What the Alpine Linux Packages Scraper does

This Actor reads the public Alpine Linux package index at pkgs.alpinelinux.org and returns one clean record per package:

• Listing fields (always) — name, version, branch, repository, architecture, description, license, project URL, maintainer, build date, and the package page URL.
• Dependency enrichment (optional) — turn on includeDependencies and each package is enriched from its detail page with install size, origin, commit hash, commit URL, build time, and full depends, provides, and subPackages lists.

You control the package name glob, the branch, the repository, the architecture, and how many records come back. Every record carries a scrapedAt timestamp.

🎬 Full Demo (🚧 Coming soon)

⚙️ Input

Field	Type	Description
name	string	Glob filter for the package name. Use * and ? as wildcards, for example apk*, python3*, or *ssl*. Use * alone to match every package.
branch	select	Alpine release branch. edge (rolling) or a stable v3.x release.
repo	select	Repository to query. All, main, community, or testing.
arch	select	CPU architecture. All, x86_64, aarch64, and seven more.
includeDependencies	boolean	Enrich each package from its detail page with commit, build time, and dependency lists. Slower.
maxItems	integer	How many records to return. Free plan is capped at 10.

Example 1 — apk packages on edge with full dependency data

{
    "name": "apk*",
    "branch": "edge",
    "repo": "main",
    "arch": "x86_64",
    "includeDependencies": true,
    "maxItems": 50
}

Example 2 — every Python package on a stable branch, listing only

{
    "name": "python3*",
    "branch": "v3.21",
    "repo": "",
    "arch": "x86_64",
    "includeDependencies": false,
    "maxItems": 200
}

⚠️ Good to Know: the edge branch is the rolling development tree and changes often, while v3.x branches are stable. Turning on includeDependencies visits one extra page per package, so large runs take noticeably longer. Leave it off when you only need version, license, and maintainer data.

📊 Output

Each enriched record looks like this:

Field	Description
📦 name	Package name
🏷 version	Package version and release
🌿 branch	Alpine branch (edge or v3.x)
🗂 repo	Repository (main, community, testing)
🖥 arch	CPU architecture
📝 description	Short package description
⚖️ license	SPDX license identifier
🌐 projectUrl	Upstream project link
👤 maintainer	Package maintainer
📅 buildDate	Build date from the index
🔗 url	Alpine package page URL
📦 size	Download size
💾 installedSize	Installed size
🌱 origin	Origin (source) package
🔑 commit	aports commit hash
🔗 commitUrl	Link to the commit
🛠 buildTime	Exact build timestamp
🔢 depends	List of runtime dependencies
🎁 provides	List of provided names
🧩 subPackages	List of related sub packages
🕒 scrapedAt	Collection timestamp
❌ error	Null on success

The size, installedSize, origin, commit, commitUrl, buildTime, depends, provides, and subPackages fields are only present when includeDependencies is enabled.

Real sample — enriched package

{
    "name": "apkbuild-cpan",
    "version": "3.17.0-r0",
    "branch": "edge",
    "repo": "main",
    "arch": "x86_64",
    "description": "Script to generate perl APKBUILD from CPAN",
    "license": "GPL-2.0-only",
    "projectUrl": "https://gitlab.alpinelinux.org/alpine/abuild/",
    "maintainer": "Natanael Copa",
    "buildDate": "2026-06-05 11:57:06",
    "url": "https://pkgs.alpinelinux.org/package/edge/main/x86_64/apkbuild-cpan",
    "size": "8.0KiB",
    "installedSize": "24.3KiB",
    "origin": "abuild",
    "commit": "c34e25a150fccc32194346cb335ed746d6878031",
    "commitUrl": "https://gitlab.alpinelinux.org/alpine/aports/-/commit/c34e25a150fccc32194346cb335ed746d6878031",
    "buildTime": "2026-06-05 11:57:06",
    "depends": ["perl", "perl-libwww", "perl-json", "perl-module-build", "perl-module-build-tiny", "perl-lwp-protocol-https"],
    "provides": ["cmd:apkbuild-cpan"],
    "subPackages": ["abuild-doc", "abuild-rootbld", "abuild-sudo", "apkbuild-cpan", "apkbuild-gem-resolver", "apkbuild-pypi"],
    "scrapedAt": "2026-06-08T18:03:11.403Z",
    "error": null
}

Real sample — apk-tools

{
    "name": "apk-tools",
    "version": "3.0.6-r0",
    "branch": "edge",
    "repo": "main",
    "arch": "x86_64",
    "description": "Alpine Package Keeper - package manager for alpine",
    "license": "GPL-2.0-only",
    "projectUrl": "https://gitlab.alpinelinux.org/alpine/apk-tools",
    "maintainer": "Natanael Copa",
    "buildDate": "2026-04-13 09:23:00",
    "url": "https://pkgs.alpinelinux.org/package/edge/main/x86_64/apk-tools",
    "size": "53.4KiB",
    "installedSize": "112.4KiB",
    "origin": "apk-tools",
    "commit": "1403ea7a8ae3fb8e5a11207ddb1ff536eb8de912",
    "commitUrl": "https://gitlab.alpinelinux.org/alpine/aports/-/commit/1403ea7a8ae3fb8e5a11207ddb1ff536eb8de912",
    "buildTime": "2026-04-13 09:23:00",
    "depends": ["musl", "libcrypto3", "libapk", "ca-certificates-bundle", "so:libapk.so.3.0.0", "so:libc.musl-x86_64.so.1", "so:libz.so.1"],
    "provides": ["apk-tools3", "cmd:apk"],
    "subPackages": ["apk-tools-bash-completion", "apk-tools-dbg", "apk-tools-dev", "apk-tools-doc", "apk-tools-static", "apk-tools-zsh-completion", "libapk", "lua5.5-apk", "py3-apk"],
    "scrapedAt": "2026-06-08T18:03:14.000Z",
    "error": null
}

Real sample — listing only

{
    "name": "python3",
    "version": "3.14.3-r0",
    "branch": "edge",
    "repo": "main",
    "arch": "x86_64",
    "description": "High-level scripting language",
    "license": "PSF-2.0",
    "projectUrl": "https://www.python.org/",
    "maintainer": "Natanael Copa",
    "buildDate": "2026-03-27 19:39:08",
    "url": "https://pkgs.alpinelinux.org/package/edge/main/x86_64/python3",
    "scrapedAt": "2026-06-08T18:01:33.970Z",
    "error": null
}

✨ Why choose this Actor

• One clean record per package, with stable field names that map onto a database schema.
• Filter exactly the slice you need by name glob, branch, repository, and architecture.
• Optional dependency enrichment expands depends, provides, and sub packages into ready arrays.
• No account, no key, and no login required.
• Pulls live from the official Alpine index, so versions reflect the catalog at run time.

📈 How it compares to alternatives

Approach	Effort	Structured fields	Dependencies	Maintenance
This Actor	One run	Yes	Optional, expanded	None on your side
Parsing APKINDEX by hand	Hours	Manual	Manual	Constant
Scraping the site yourself	Days	Depends	You build it	You own the upkeep

🚀 How to use

1. Create a free Apify account using this sign-up link.
2. Open the Alpine Linux Packages Scraper.
3. Set the name glob, then pick a branch, repo, and arch.
4. Toggle includeDependencies if you want commit and dependency data, and set maxItems.
5. Click Start and grab your results when the run finishes.

💼 Business use cases

Security and compliance

Goal	How this helps
Audit licenses across a branch	Pull license for every matching package
Track vulnerable versions	Snapshot version and commit over time

Platform and containers

Goal	How this helps
Pin base image packages	Capture exact versions per architecture
Build a software bill of materials	Use the expanded depends and provides lists

Packaging and maintenance

Goal	How this helps
Watch a package across branches	Re-run per branch and compare versions
Find who owns a package	Read the maintainer and origin fields

Mirrors and tooling

Goal	How this helps
Snapshot the index	Export the full listing for offline use
Feed an internal catalog	Load records into your own search tool

🔌 Automating Alpine Linux Packages Scraper

Connect runs to the tools you already use:

• Make and Zapier to trigger runs and route records into sheets or databases.
• Slack to post a summary when a run finishes.
• Airbyte to load results into a warehouse.
• GitHub Actions to schedule periodic snapshots.
• Google Drive to archive each run's output.

🌟 Beyond business use cases

• Research: study how a distribution's package set evolves across releases.
• Personal: keep a watchlist of the packages you depend on.
• Non-profit: power a community mirror or documentation project.
• Experimentation: prototype a package search app without writing a scraper.

🤖 Ask an AI assistant

Paste your results into ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, or Microsoft Copilot and ask it to diff versions between branches, group packages by license, or map a dependency tree.

❓ Frequently Asked Questions

Do I need an Alpine Linux account or an API key? No. The Actor reads the public package index at pkgs.alpinelinux.org, which needs no login or key.

Which branches can I query? The rolling edge branch and the stable releases v3.23 down to v3.15.

Which repositories and architectures are supported? main, community, and testing repositories, and architectures including x86_64, aarch64, armhf, armv7, ppc64le, riscv64, s390x, x86, and loongarch64.

How does the name filter work? It is a glob. Use * and ? as wildcards, for example apk* matches everything starting with apk, and *ssl* matches anything containing ssl.

What is the difference with and without dependency enrichment? Without it you get the listing table fields. With includeDependencies on, each package also returns install size, origin, commit, build time, and the full depends, provides, and sub package lists, at the cost of one extra page visit per package.

Why are some detail fields missing on a record? The extra fields only appear when includeDependencies is enabled. With it off, records carry the listing fields only.

How current is the data? Each run pulls live from the Alpine index, so versions and build dates reflect the catalog at run time.

Can I get every package? Yes. Use * as the name with a high maxItems. The Actor pages through the full result set for your filters.

What does the origin field mean? It is the source package a binary package is built from. Several binary packages can share one origin.

Can I schedule this? Yes. Use Apify Schedules to snapshot the index on any cadence you like.

🔌 Integrate with any app

Results are available through the Apify API, so you can pull them into any app, database, or workflow you already run.

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⚠️ Disclaimer: independent tool, not affiliated with Alpine Linux. Only publicly available data is collected.