🎶 MusicBrainz Scraper

🚀 Scrape music metadata from MusicBrainz covering 70M+ recordings. Get artists, albums, recordings, and labels with genres, countries, release dates, barcodes, and catalog numbers. Search by name across three modes with country and type filters.

🕒 Last updated: 2026-04-23

Whether you're building a music metadata service, researching artist discographies, or creating a catalog of recordings, this tool makes it easy to collect structured music data from the world's most comprehensive open music encyclopedia.

The MusicBrainz Scraper collects artists, releases, and recordings with names, dates, countries, labels, track counts, durations, tags, and more. Search by keyword and filter by country and type.

Target Audience	Music services, app developers, music researchers, record labels, journalists
Primary Use Cases	Metadata enrichment, discography research, catalog building, genre analysis

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📋 What Does It Do

This tool collects music metadata from MusicBrainz, supporting three search modes with country and type filters. It delivers:

• 🎤 Artist data - names, types, countries, areas, active years, tags, and aliases
• 💿 Release data - titles, release dates, countries, barcodes, labels, catalog numbers, track counts, and formats
• 🎵 Recording data - song titles, durations, artist credits, first release dates, and release counts
• 🌍 Country filtering - narrow results by country code (US, GB, DE, JP, etc.)
• 🏷️ Type filtering - filter artists by Group or Person, releases by Album, Single, or EP
• 🔍 Flexible search - find anything in the MusicBrainz database by keyword

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🎬 How to Use the MusicBrainz Scraper - Full Demo

🚧 Demo video coming soon

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⚙️ Input

To start collecting music metadata, simply fill in the input form:

Field	Type	Description
Max Items	Integer	Free users: Limited to 10 items (preview). Paid users: Optional, max 1,000,000.
Mode	Select	What to search: Artists, Releases, or Recordings.
Search Query	String	Search query (e.g. "radiohead", "abbey road", "creep").
Country	String	Filter by country code (e.g. "US", "GB", "DE").
Type	String	Filter by type. For artists: "Group" or "Person". For releases: "Album", "Single", or "EP".

Example 1: Search for artists

{
    "mode": "artists",
    "query": "radiohead",
    "maxItems": 50,
    "country": "GB",
    "type": "Group"
}

Example 2: Search for albums

{
    "mode": "releases",
    "query": "abbey road",
    "maxItems": 20,
    "type": "Album"
}

⚠️ Free users are limited to 10 items per run. Sign up for a paid plan to collect up to 1,000,000 items.

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📊 Output

After the Actor finishes its run, you'll get a dataset with the output. You can download results as Excel, HTML, XML, JSON, or CSV.

🧾 Output Schema

Artist Fields:

Field	Type	Description
id	String	MusicBrainz unique identifier
name	String	Artist or band name
sortName	String	Sort-friendly name
type	String	Type (Group, Person, Orchestra, etc.)
country	String	Country code
areaName	String	Geographic area
beginDate	String	Career/life start date
endDate	String	Career/life end date
tags	Array	Community tags with vote counts
aliases	Array	Alternative names
url	String	Artist page on MusicBrainz
scrapedAt	String	Timestamp of data collection

📦 Sample Output

Sample 1 (Artist):

{
    "id": "a74b1b7f-71a5-4011-9441-d0b5e4122711",
    "name": "Radiohead",
    "sortName": "Radiohead",
    "type": "Group",
    "country": "GB",
    "areaName": "United Kingdom",
    "beginAreaName": "Abingdon",
    "beginDate": "1985",
    "endDate": null,
    "ended": false,
    "tags": [{"name": "alternative rock", "count": 10}, {"name": "electronic", "count": 8}],
    "aliases": [],
    "score": 100,
    "url": "https://musicbrainz.org/artist/a74b1b7f-71a5-4011-9441-d0b5e4122711",
    "scrapedAt": "2026-04-09T12:00:00.000Z"
}

Sample 2 (Release):

{
    "id": "b84ee12a-09ef-421b-82de-0441a926375b",
    "title": "OK Computer",
    "artistName": "Radiohead",
    "date": "1997-06-16",
    "country": "GB",
    "labelName": "Parlophone",
    "catalogNumber": "CDNODATA 02",
    "trackCount": 12,
    "mediaFormat": "CD",
    "url": "https://musicbrainz.org/release/b84ee12a-09ef-421b-82de-0441a926375b",
    "scrapedAt": "2026-04-09T12:00:00.000Z"
}

Sample 3 (Recording):

{
    "id": "d6f3b56e-7b6d-4a27-9f1e-d1d7d18d33cd",
    "title": "Creep",
    "artistName": "Radiohead",
    "lengthMs": 238000,
    "lengthFormatted": "3:58",
    "firstReleaseDate": "1992-09-21",
    "releasesCount": 45,
    "url": "https://musicbrainz.org/recording/d6f3b56e-7b6d-4a27-9f1e-d1d7d18d33cd",
    "scrapedAt": "2026-04-09T12:00:00.000Z"
}

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✨ Why Choose the MusicBrainz Scraper?

Benefit	Description
⚡ Batch collection	Collect up to 1M items at once
🎤 Three modes	Artists, releases, and recordings in a single tool
🌍 Country filtering	Filter by any country code
🏷️ Type filtering	Narrow by Group/Person or Album/Single/EP
📁 Structured output	Export to JSON, CSV, or Excel
🔄 Automated scheduling	Set up regular monitoring
🎯 No coding required	Point-and-click interface

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📈 How Does It Compare?

Feature	Our Tool	Manual Website Search
Batch collection	✅ Up to 1M items	❌ Browse one at a time
Three search modes	✅ Artists, releases, recordings	⚠️ Separate searches
Country filtering	✅ By country code	⚠️ Advanced search only
Structured output	✅ JSON, CSV, Excel	❌ Web pages only
Tags and aliases	✅ Included automatically	⚠️ Click each entry

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🚀 How to Use

1. Sign Up - Create a free account w/ $5 credit (takes 2 minutes)
2. Find the Scraper - Search for "MusicBrainz Scraper" in the Apify Store
3. Set Input - Choose your mode, enter a search query, and set filters
4. Run It - Click "Start" and let it collect your data
5. Download Data - Get your results in the "Dataset" tab as CSV, Excel, or JSON

Total Time: 100 items in about 5-10 seconds No Technical Skills Required: Everything is point-and-click

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💼 Business Use Cases

Music Services and App Developers:

• Build metadata databases with accurate artist, album, and song information
• Power music apps with rich metadata including tags, aliases, and release details
• Enrich existing music catalogs with MusicBrainz identifiers

Researchers and Record Labels:

• Analyze artist origins, genre distributions, and release patterns across countries
• Catalog releases with barcodes, catalog numbers, and format details
• Study music history with structured data on artists, recordings, and timelines

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✨ Why choose this Actor

	Capability
🎯	Built for the job. Scoped specifically to this data source so you skip the parser engineering entirely.
🔖	Structured output. Clean, typed fields ready for analysis, dashboards, or downstream pipelines.
⚡	Fast. Optimized request patterns return results in seconds, not minutes.
🔁	Always fresh. Every run pulls live data, so the dataset reflects the source as of run time.
🌐	No infra to manage. Apify handles proxies, retries, scaling, scheduling, and storage.
🛡️	Reliable. Battle-tested across many runs and edge cases, with graceful error handling.
🚫	No code required. Configure in the UI, run from CLI, schedule via cron, or call from any language with the Apify SDK.

📊 Production-grade structured data without the engineering overhead of building and maintaining your own scraper.

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📈 How it compares to alternatives

Approach	Cost	Coverage	Refresh	Filters	Setup
⭐ MusicBrainz Scraper (this Actor)	$5 free credit, then pay-per-use	Full source coverage	Live per run	Source-native filters supported	⚡ 2 min
Build your own scraper	Engineering hours	Full once built	Whenever you maintain it	Custom code	🐢 Days to weeks
Paid managed APIs	$$$ monthly	Vendor-defined	Live	Vendor-defined	⏳ Hours
Third-party data dumps	Varies	Subset, often stale	Periodic	None	🕒 Variable

Pick this Actor when you want broad coverage, server-side filtering, and no pipeline maintenance.

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🚀 How to use

1. 📝 Sign up. Create a free account with $5 credit (takes 2 minutes).
2. 🌐 Open the Actor. Go to the MusicBrainz Scraper page on the Apify Store.
3. 🎯 Set input. Configure the input fields in the form (or paste a JSON), then set maxItems.
4. 🚀 Run it. Click Start and let the Actor collect your data.
5. 📥 Download. Grab your results in the Dataset tab as CSV, Excel, JSON, or XML.

⏱️ Total time from signup to downloaded dataset: 3-5 minutes. No coding required.

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💼 Business use cases

📊 Data & Analytics Build trend reports and dashboards from live source data Feed BI tools, warehouses, and ML pipelines with structured records Run periodic snapshots to track changes over time Compare segments, regions, or categories with consistent fields	🏢 Operations & Strategy Monitor competitor moves, pricing, and inventory shifts Build internal directories and lookup tools backed by current data Power workflows that depend on fresh source records Cut manual data-gathering time from hours to minutes
🎯 Marketing & Growth Identify market opportunities and trending topics Research target audiences and customer personas at scale Power lead-generation pipelines with verified records Track sentiment, reviews, or social signals over time	🛠️ Engineering & Product Prototype features that need real-world data without owning a crawler Replace fragile in-house scrapers with a managed Actor Wire datasets into your apps via the Apify API or webhooks Skip the proxy, retry, and parsing maintenance entirely

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🌟 Beyond business use cases

Data like this powers more than commercial workflows. The same structured records support research, education, civic projects, and personal initiatives.

🎓 Research and academia Empirical datasets for papers, thesis work, and coursework Longitudinal studies tracking changes across snapshots Reproducible research with cited, versioned data pulls Classroom exercises on data analysis and ethical scraping	🎨 Personal and creative Side projects, portfolio demos, and indie app launches Data visualizations, dashboards, and infographics Content research for bloggers, YouTubers, and podcasters Hobbyist collections and personal trackers
🤝 Non-profit and civic Transparency reporting and accountability projects Advocacy campaigns backed by public-interest data Community-run databases for local issues Investigative journalism on public records	🧪 Experimentation Prototype AI and machine-learning pipelines with real data Validate product-market hypotheses before engineering spend Train small domain-specific models on niche corpora Test dashboard concepts with live input

🤖 Ask an AI assistant about this scraper

Open a ready-to-send prompt about this ParseForge actor in the AI of your choice:

• 💬 ChatGPT
• 🧠 Claude
• 🔍 Perplexity
• 🅒 Copilot

💰 How much does it cost?

Apify gives you $5 in free monthly credits on the Apify Free plan, enough to test MusicBrainz Scraper and pull a real sample dataset. For ongoing usage:

• Starter plan ($49/month) — Recommended for individuals running MusicBrainz Scraper regularly. Includes higher concurrency and larger datasets.
• Scale plan ($499/month) — Recommended for teams running MusicBrainz Scraper at production scale.

Pay-Per-Event pricing means you only pay for what you actually use. Failed runs are never charged. See the Pricing tab on this Actor's page for exact event prices.

💡 Tips for using MusicBrainz Scraper

• Start with a small maxItems (3-10) to validate output format before running larger jobs.
• Use Apify Schedules to run MusicBrainz Scraper on a recurring basis and keep your dataset fresh.
• Export via Integrations: Apify connects to Google Sheets, Airbyte, Make, Zapier, and direct webhooks — pipe your data anywhere.
• Monitor with webhooks: trigger downstream workflows the moment a run finishes.
• Re-run failed items: if any individual records error out, re-run with their inputs only. Failed events are not charged.

⚖️ Is it legal to use MusicBrainz Scraper?

Yes. MusicBrainz Scraper only collects publicly available data. Web scraping public data has been confirmed as legal by US courts (see hiQ Labs v. LinkedIn) and is widely used for research, market analysis, and business intelligence.

However, you are responsible for:

• Respecting the source website's Terms of Service.
• Complying with GDPR, CCPA, and other applicable data-protection laws when personal data is involved.
• Not republishing copyrighted content without permission.

If you have specific compliance concerns, consult your legal team. See the Apify legal docs for more.

❓ Frequently Asked Questions

🔌 Automating Your Workflows

For advanced users who want to automate this process, you can control the scraper programmatically with the Apify API.

• Node.js: Install the apify-client NPM package
• Python: Use the apify-client PyPI package
• See the Apify API reference for full details

🔌 Integrate MusicBrainz Scraper with any app

Last but not least, MusicBrainz Scraper can be connected with almost any cloud service or web app thanks to integrations on the Apify platform.

These include:

• Make - Automate music data workflows
• Zapier - Get alerts for new releases or artists
• Slack - Get notified in your team channel
• Airbyte - Build data pipelines
• GitHub - Version control integration
• Google Drive - Export music data to spreadsheets

Alternatively, you can use webhooks to carry out an action whenever an event occurs, e.g. get a notification whenever MusicBrainz Scraper successfully finishes a run.

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🔌 Integrate with any app

MusicBrainz Scraper connects to any cloud service via Apify integrations:

• Make - Automate multi-step workflows
• Zapier - Connect with 5,000+ apps
• Slack - Get run notifications in your channels
• Airbyte - Pipe results into your warehouse
• GitHub - Trigger runs from commits and releases
• Google Drive - Export datasets straight to Sheets

You can also use webhooks to trigger downstream actions when a run finishes. Push fresh data into your product backend, or alert your team in Slack.

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Pro Tip: 💡 Browse our complete collection of data collection actors to find the perfect tool for your business needs.

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🆘 Need Help?

• Check the FAQ section above for common questions
• Visit the Apify documentation for platform guides
• Contact us at Tally contact form

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⚠️ Disclaimer: This Actor is an independent tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by MusicBrainz or the MetaBrainz Foundation. All trademarks mentioned are the property of their respective owners.