# Universal Web Scraper & Change Monitor (`paul_shonowo/universal-web-scraper-monitor`) Actor

Production-ready Playwright web scraper and change detection engine.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/paul\_shonowo/universal-web-scraper-monitor.md
- **Developed by:** [Paul Shonowo](https://apify.com/paul_shonowo) (community)
- **Categories:**
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 60.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

Pay per usage

This Actor is paid per platform usage. The Actor is free to use, and you only pay for the Apify platform usage, which gets cheaper the higher subscription plan you have.

Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/actors/running/actors-in-store.md#pay-per-usage

## What's an Apify Actor?

Actors are web data automations that power AI and operations. They run on the Apify platform to scrape websites, process data, connect APIs, and automate workflows.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.
Actors are written with capital "A".

## How to integrate an Actor?

If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.
The best way to integrate Actors is as follows.

- **AI agents and MCP clients** — the [Apify MCP server](https://docs.apify.com/integrations/mcp.md) at `https://mcp.apify.com` (remote, streamable HTTP, OAuth on first use).
- **Agentic workflows and local Actor development** — [Agent Skills](https://apify.com/.well-known/agent-skills/index.json) with the [Apify CLI](https://docs.apify.com/cli/docs.md): `npm install -g apify-cli`, then `apify login`.
- **JavaScript/TypeScript projects** — the official [JS/TS client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md): `npm install apify-client`.
- **Python projects** — the official [Python client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md): `pip install apify-client`.
- **Any other language** — the [REST API](https://docs.apify.com/api/v2.md).

For usage examples, see the [API](#api) section below.

For more details, see Apify documentation as [Markdown index](https://docs.apify.com/llms.txt) and [Markdown full-text](https://docs.apify.com/llms-full.txt).

# README

## Universal Web Scraper & Change Monitor

A production-grade, headless browser web scraping and visual change monitoring engine built with Python and Playwright. Designed for enterprise data extraction, automated monitoring, and seamless cloud pipeline integration.

### Key Features

- Dynamic Content Handling: Full Playwright rendering supports JavaScript-heavy Single Page Applications (SPAs), React, Vue, and Angular sites.
- Change Detection Engine: Tracks DOM structural and content modifications over time with high precision.
- Cloud-Native & Production-Ready: Designed for cloud execution with minimal memory footprint and fast startup times.
- Structured JSON Dataset Output: Outputs clean, normalized JSON records with standard execution timestamps.

### Input Parameters

| Parameter | Type | Required | Description |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| startUrls | Array | Yes | List of web pages to scrape and monitor. |
| maxDepth | Integer | No | Maximum link navigation depth (default: 1). |
| extractSelectors | Object | No | Custom CSS selectors mapped to target data keys. |

### Output Data Format

The Actor outputs structured JSON objects to the default Apify Dataset containing execution timestamps, target URLs, page titles, and extracted data payloads.

### Integration & Export

Data can be exported via Apify API, webhooks, or direct Google Cloud Storage / BigQuery connectors in standard formats (JSON, CSV, Excel).

# Actor input Schema

## `targetUrl` (type: `string`):

The webpage URL you want to scrape.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "targetUrl": "https://example.com"
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `timestamp` (type: `string`):

ISO 8601 UTC execution timestamp

## `target_url` (type: `string`):

The URL scraped by the engine

## `title` (type: `string`):

DOM document title extracted via Playwright

## `data` (type: `string`):

Scraped DOM elements and status payload

# API

You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.

## JavaScript example

```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
    token: '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>',
});

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("paul_shonowo/universal-web-scraper-monitor").call(input);

// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.dir(item);
});

// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs

```

## Python example

```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient

# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_API_TOKEN>")

# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = {}

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("paul_shonowo/universal-web-scraper-monitor").call(run_input=run_input)

# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print(f"💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}")
for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items():
    print(item)

# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start

```

## CLI example

```bash
echo '{}' |
apify call paul_shonowo/universal-web-scraper-monitor --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,paul_shonowo/universal-web-scraper-monitor"
        }
    }
}

```

The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer <APIFY_API_TOKEN>` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations).

## OpenAPI specification

Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/Zbt2rQthuPhasyqVM/builds/82u7x4rtGKFqF9UtS/openapi.json