Wikimedia Commons Deletion Scraper

Wikimedia Commons Deletion Scraper

Scrape Wikimedia Commons deletion nominations from any category, up to a million per run. Each nomination comes with its page ID, namespace, and title, ready for export to CSV, JSON, Excel, or XML. No login or API key required.

Wikimedia Commons has no official API for deletion nominations, and the public deletion request pages are cluttered and hard to parse. This Actor reads the deletion request categories directly from the MediaWiki API, returning each nomination as a clean, flat row. You get the page ID, namespace, and title for every file or page currently under deletion review.

Who uses it	What they scrape Wikimedia Commons for
Wikimedia Commons administrators	Monitor new deletion requests and review them efficiently
Digital archivists	Track which files are at risk of removal from the public domain
Researchers studying content moderation	Analyze deletion patterns and community decision-making on Commons
GLAM institutions (galleries, libraries, archives, museums)	Check whether their contributed media has been nominated for deletion

What it does

This Actor collects deletion nominations from any Wikimedia Commons category and returns each one as a flat row with page ID, namespace, and title.

• 📂 Category-based scraping: point the Actor at any deletion request category, including subcategories like monthly logs.
• 🔢 Flexible limits: set a maximum number of items to return, from a single preview row to a full million.
• 📊 Structured output: every nomination is returned as a flat row with page ID, namespace, and title, ready for analysis.
• 🌐 No authentication: the Actor uses the public MediaWiki API, so no login, OAuth, or API key is needed.

Results export to CSV, JSON, Excel, or XML, or straight from the API.

What you can do with Wikimedia Commons data

🗂️ Monitor deletion backlogs.

A Commons administrator runs the Actor daily on the main deletion requests category to get a fresh list of all pending nominations, then triages them by namespace or title pattern.

📉 Analyze deletion trends.

A researcher scrapes a year of monthly deletion request subcategories to build a dataset of nomination counts, reasons, and outcomes for a study on community governance.

🏛️ Protect institutional uploads.

A museum's digital team runs the Actor weekly on categories containing their contributed files to catch any deletion nominations early and respond before files are removed.

🔍 Audit at-risk public domain works.

An archivist scrapes deletion nominations for files with certain title patterns to identify which public domain works are under threat and prioritize preservation efforts.

Why choose this scraper

	What you get
No official API	Wikimedia Commons does not offer a dedicated deletion nominations API, so this Actor fills that gap by reading the category structure directly.
Clean, flat rows	Each nomination is returned as a simple row with page ID, namespace, and title, making it easy to load into spreadsheets or databases.
Scalable	From a quick preview of 10 items to a full archive of up to a million nominations, the Actor adapts to your needs.
No anti-bot hurdles	The MediaWiki API is designed for programmatic access, so you avoid the hCaptcha and HTML parsing issues of the public pages.

What a Wikimedia Commons record looks like

Every record returns as one flat JSON row. Here is a real one from a run:

{
 "pageid": 135557803,
 "ns": 6,
 "title": "File:GodPrey & Vuss Vilanculos - Crazy.ogg",
 "url": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AGodPrey_%26_Vuss_Vilanculos_-_Crazy.ogg",
 "discussionLink": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons%3ADeletion_requests%2FGodPrey_%26_Vuss_Vilanculos_-_Crazy.ogg",
 "scrapedAt": "2026-08-24T17:42:36.466Z"
}

Every value above comes from a real run. A field a record does not have comes back as null.

Configure the run

Drive the Actor from any deletion request category, and set a maximum number of items to return. The Actor reads the category members directly from the MediaWiki API, so only matching nominations reach your dataset. The Input tab lists every parameter.

A first run with the defaults:

{
 "categoryTitle": "Category:Deletion_requests",
 "maxItems": 10
}

A larger pull:

{
 "categoryTitle": "Category:Deletion_requests",
 "maxItems": 200
}

Free users

Free-plan runs return up to 10 results as a preview. Upgrade your Apify plan to collect up to 1,000,000 results per run.

Run it

1. Create a free Apify account with $5 in credit.
2. Open the Wikimedia Commons Deletion Scraper.
3. Set your inputs and any filters, then click Start.
4. Export the results as CSV, Excel, JSON, or XML from the Dataset tab.

Run it programmatically through the Apify API (run-sync-get-dataset-items) or the ApifyClient for JavaScript and Python.

Use with AI agents (MCP)

Give an AI agent live access to Wikimedia Commons through the Model Context Protocol. Add the Actor to Claude, Cursor, or any MCP client:

$claude mcp add --transport http apify "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=parseforge/wikimedia-commons-deletion-scraper"

Then prompt it in plain language to run the scraper and read back the results.

Troubleshooting

Why am I getting no results?

Check that the categoryTitle input is spelled exactly as it appears on Commons, including the 'Category:' prefix and underscores instead of spaces. Also ensure the category contains deletion nominations.

The Actor returns fewer items than I expected.

The maxItems input limits the number of results. If you are a free user, the limit is 10. Paid users can increase it up to 1,000,000.

I get an error about the category not existing.

Verify the category title on Wikimedia Commons. Some categories use different naming conventions, such as 'Category:Deletion requests/2025/January' instead of 'Category:Deletion requests January 2025'.

The output contains duplicate entries.

The MediaWiki API may return the same page if it appears in multiple subcategories. Use the pageid field to deduplicate your dataset.

FAQ

Question	Answer
What exactly does this Actor return?	For each deletion nomination, the Actor returns the page ID, namespace, and title of the nominated file or page. The exact fields are shown in the sample output.
Do I need a Wikimedia account or API key?	No. The Actor uses the public MediaWiki API, which does not require authentication for reading category members.
Can I scrape a specific month's deletion requests?	Yes. Wikimedia Commons organizes deletion requests into monthly subcategories like 'Category:Deletion requests January 2025'. set the categoryTitle input to that subcategory.
What is the maximum number of items I can scrape?	Free users are limited to 10 items as a preview. Paid users can set maxItems up to 1,000,000.
Does this Actor get the deletion discussion text?	No, it only returns the list of nominated pages from the category. To get the discussion content, you would need to scrape each nomination page separately.
How often is the data updated?	The Actor reads live data from the Wikimedia Commons API every time it runs, so you always get the current state of the category.
Can I filter by file type or namespace?	The Actor returns all category members regardless of namespace. You can filter the results after export using the namespace field.
Is this Actor affiliated with Wikimedia?	No, this is an independent tool built on the public MediaWiki API. It is not endorsed by or affiliated with the Wikimedia Foundation.

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Browse the full ParseForge collection for more scrapers.

🆘 Need help? Email parseforge@protonmail.com with your run ID, your input, and what you expected.

⚠️ Disclaimer. This Actor is unofficial and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Wikimedia Foundation. It collects only publicly available data. You are responsible for using the collected data in compliance with the source's terms of service and applicable data-protection laws, including GDPR, CCPA, and PIPL. Do not use it to collect personal data unlawfully.

💰 How much does it cost to scrape Wikimedia Commons Deletion?

This Actor uses pay-per-result pricing: $0.004 per result collected. You are billed only for the results you receive, so a run that returns nothing costs nothing.