🎓 College Navigator Scraper

🚀 Export US college and university directory data in seconds. Pull IPEDS institution profiles: name, address, control, highest degree, EIN, OPEID, Title IV, and more. Download as CSV, Excel, JSON, or XML.

🕒 Last updated: 2026-05-26 · 📊 30+ fields per record · 6,500+ institutions · United States

The College Navigator Scraper queries the Urban Institute Education Data API, which mirrors the NCES IPEDS dataset that powers nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator.

Coverage: United States.

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Target Audience / Use Cases

🎯 Target Audience	💡 Primary Use Cases
Edtech vendors	Build institution directories
Researchers	Higher-ed analyses
Marketers	College outreach lists
Policy analysts	Title IV / public-private studies
Students/parents	Compare schools

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📋 What this scraper does

• IPEDS directory by year
• Filter by state FIPS code
• Returns 30+ institutional fields
• CSV, Excel, JSON, XML

💡 Why it matters: structured access to college navigator data unlocks workflows that manual UI browsing cannot reach.

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🎬 Full Demo

🚧 Coming soon

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⚙️ Input

Field	Type	Required	Default	Description
maxItems	integer	No	10	Max records.
fips	string	No	06	Filter.
year	string	No	2022	Filter.

Example 1:

{"fips":"06","year":2022,"maxItems":50}

Example 2:

{"year":2022,"maxItems":500}

⚠️ Good to Know: results reflect the live source at scrape time.

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📊 Output

Sample:

{
  "instName": "Brown University",
  "city": "Providence",
  "state": "RI",
  "instControl": 2,
  "opeid": "00340100",
  "ein": "050258809",
  "urlSchool": "www.brown.edu/"
}

Each record exposes 30+ fields plus sourceUrl, scrapedAt, error.

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✨ Why choose this Actor

• 🟢 Free IPEDS-powered data
• 🟢 No API key
• 🟢 30+ fields per record
• 🟢 Up to 1M paid

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📈 How it compares to alternatives

Option	Free	Bulk export	Live
College Navigator UI	Yes	No	Yearly
IPEDS CSV	Yes	Yes	Yearly
ParseForge College Navigator	Yes	Yes	Yes

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🚀 How to use

1. Create a free account w/ $5 credit
2. Open this actor
3. Set inputs, click Start
4. Download CSV / Excel / JSON / XML
5. Schedule or integrate

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💼 Business use cases

Higher-ed marketing lists

Works out of the box.

College comparison tools

Works out of the box.

Research dashboards

Works out of the box.

EdTech onboarding directories

Works out of the box.

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🔌 Automating College Navigator Scraper

Integrates with Make, Zapier, n8n, Slack, Airbyte, GitHub Actions, Google Drive.

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🌟 Beyond business use cases

Personal college selection

Ready to use.

Academic research

Ready to use.

Non-profit access studies

Ready to use.

Data journalism

Ready to use.

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🤖 Ask an AI assistant about this scraper

ChatGPT · Claude · Perplexity · Microsoft Copilot

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❓ Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Source? Urban Institute Education Data API (IPEDS mirror).

Q: API key? No.

Q: Coverage? 6,500+ Title IV institutions.

Q: Output formats? JSON, CSV, Excel, XML.

Q: Free preview? 10 records.

Q: Bulk size? Up to 1,000,000 paid.

Q: Output formats? JSON, CSV, Excel, XML.

Q: How often is the data refreshed? On every run.

Q: Schedule support? Yes - schedule from the Apify console.

Q: Free preview? Yes - 10 records.

Q: Paid bulk size? Up to 1,000,000 records per run.

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🔌 Integrate with any app

Webhooks, REST API, Make, Zapier, Slack, Airbyte, Google Sheets, and more.

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🔗 Recommended Actors

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Coursera Scraper	Companion dataset
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Federal Register Scraper	Companion dataset

💡 Pro Tip: browse the complete ParseForge collection.

🆘 Need Help? Open our contact form

⚠️ Disclaimer: independent tool, not affiliated with the National Center for Education Statistics or Urban Institute. Only publicly available data is collected.