Bulk File & Image Downloader: URLs to Storage

Paste a list of file URLs and get every file saved to Apify storage with a direct download link, content type, size, HTTP status and SHA-256 hash. Images, PDFs, CSV and Excel files, ZIP archives, audio: any direct file link works. It downloads only the URLs you give and never crawls.

Quick start for AI agents and API users

• What it does: Download files (images, PDFs, CSVs, archives) from a list of direct URLs into Apify storage.
• When to use it: For stored copies or stable links.
• Example input (the form's prefill; it finishes in under a minute):

{
  "urls": [
    "https://www.python.org/static/img/python-logo.png",
    "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/datasets/country-list/main/data.csv"
  ]
}

• Example output: one real dataset row from run L1PzvgZwrka7QhpOU (2026-10-23), with long fields shortened and empty fields left out. Fields not shown are listed in the output table below.

{
  "url": "https://www.python.org/static/img/python-logo.png",
  "finalUrl": "https://www.python.org/static/img/python-logo.png",
  "status": 200,
  "key": "00000-python-logo-9c121e61.png",
  "fileUrl": "https://api.apify.com/v2/key-value-stores/fanC1OY4771KdYuO3/records/00000-python-logo-9c121e61.png?signature=1y9yZo07DY4SXI0yaDz8K",
  "fileName": "python-logo.png",
  "contentType": "image/png",
  "sizeBytes": 15770,
  "sha256": "9c121e619bfe02eaba582d7080eea46fd53ec0b50717e6794a948fada4ae8f3c",
  "redirectCount": 0,
  "downloadMs": 10,
  "downloadedAt": "2026-10-23T19:10:24Z"
}

• Cost (pay per event, Free-plan prices): File downloaded $0.002; 10 MB transferred $0.001. Failed items are not charged.
• From an AI agent: with the Apify MCP server, call call-actor with actor phaux/bulk-file-downloader, or load it as its own tool with https://mcp.apify.com?tools=phaux/bulk-file-downloader. Read results with get-dataset-items.

What does Bulk File & Image Downloader do?

• Downloads each URL once (duplicates removed), following up to 5 redirects, and stores the file in the run's key-value store under a readable key (00007-product-photo-3f9a1c2b.jpg).
• Returns one dataset item per stored file: fileUrl (direct link), fileName, contentType, sizeBytes, status, sha256, finalUrl and redirectCount.
• Size caps: files over maxFileSizeMb (default 25 MB, up to 200 MB) are refused before or during download and not charged.
• Type filter: allowedContentTypes such as image/* or application/pdf. Web pages (often login, consent or error pages) are refused unless you allow HTML.
• Clear failure report: every URL that wasn't stored is listed in FAILED_URLS with a reason code.

Why use it?

• Archive product images, documents or data files from a URL list exported by a scraper, a spreadsheet or a CMS.
• Verify files with sha256 and sizeBytes, and spot broken links via FAILED_URLS.
• Pay only for stored files; failed, refused and filtered URLs are free.
• Polite and safe: one request at a time per host, robots.txt honoured, private addresses blocked.

Use cases: image datasets for e-commerce or ML, backing up attachments and PDFs, collecting public reports, and turning URL columns from other Actors' results into stored files.

How to use it

1. Paste direct file URLs into File URLs, one per line (up to 100,000). Empty input downloads two small example files.
2. Optionally set Max file size, Allowed content types and Max files.
3. Run it. Open the Downloaded files view for direct links, or the Image preview view for thumbnails.
4. Download individual files from fileUrl, or the whole key-value store from the run's Storage tab.

Input

{
  "urls": ["https://www.python.org/static/img/python-logo.png", "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/datasets/country-list/main/data.csv"],
  "maxFileSizeMb": 25,
  "allowedContentTypes": ["image/*", "text/csv", "text/plain"],
  "maxItems": 0,
  "requestIntervalSecs": 0.5
}

Field	Type	Default	Description
urls	array	—	Direct links to files (images, PDFs, CSV, ZIP...), one per line, up to 100,000. Duplicates are removed. Empty = a small example run.
maxFileSizeMb	integer	25	Larger files are refused before or during download (code too_large) and not charged. 1–200 MB. Files are held in memory while stored, so big limits download fewer files in parallel.
allowedContentTypes	array	—	Only store files of these types, e.g. image/*, application/pdf, text/csv. Empty = any type except web pages.
allowHtml	boolean	false	Off (default): a URL that returns a web page instead of a file (often a login, consent or error page) is refused and not charged.
keyPrefix	string	—	Optional prefix for the key-value store keys (letters, digits and !-_.'() only).
maxItems	integer	0	Stop after this many files are stored (0 = all). Also caps the cost of a run.
requestIntervalSecs	number	0.5	Politeness delay per host (0.2–30 s). A robots.txt Crawl-delay overrides it when longer.
maxConcurrency	integer	8	Downloads in flight across different hosts (1–32). One host is always served one request at a time.
timeBudgetSecs	integer	0	Stop starting new downloads after this many seconds and keep what is stored (0 = only the run timeout guard).

Output example

{
  "url": "https://www.python.org/static/img/python-logo.png",
  "finalUrl": "https://www.python.org/static/img/python-logo.png",
  "status": 200,
  "key": "00000-python-logo-9c121e61.png",
  "fileUrl": "https://api.apify.com/v2/key-value-stores/<storeId>/records/00000-python-logo-9c121e61.png?signature=…",
  "fileName": "python-logo.png",
  "contentType": "image/png",
  "sizeBytes": 15770,
  "sha256": "9c121e61…",
  "redirectCount": 0,
  "downloadMs": 85,
  "downloadedAt": "2026-10-20T21:31:45Z"
}

Output fields

Field	Type	Description
url	string	URL from your input.
finalUrl	string	URL after redirects.
status	integer	HTTP status of the download (200).
key	string	Key of the stored file in the run's default key-value store.
fileUrl	string	Direct link to the stored file in Apify storage.
fileName	string	File name from Content-Disposition or the URL path.
contentType	string	Content-Type returned by the server.
sizeBytes	integer	Size of the stored file in bytes.
sha256	string	SHA-256 hash of the file (hex), for integrity checks and de-duplication.
redirectCount	integer	Number of redirects followed (max 5).
downloadMs	integer	Download time in milliseconds.
downloadedAt	string	UTC time of the download.

FAILED_URLS reason codes: invalid_url, platform_host, blocked_host, robots_disallowed, http_error, too_large, html_response, content_type_not_allowed, empty_file, rate_limited, host_stopped, dns_error, network_error, timeout, too_many_redirects, time_budget, not_attempted. RUN_STATS has the totals.

How much does it cost?

Pay per event, the same on every Apify plan. Apify platform usage is included.

Event	Price
File downloaded (per stored file)	$0.002
10 MB transferred (per started 10 MiB of a stored file, minimum one per file)	$0.001

Examples: a 300 KB image costs $0.003; a 25 MB file costs $0.005 ($0.002 + 3 × $0.001); 1,000 small images cost $3.00. Failed, refused and filtered URLs are never charged. Use Max files to cap a run.

Use with AI agents, MCP and the API

• MCP: add https://mcp.apify.com?tools=phaux/bulk-file-downloader to an MCP client and ask, for example, "download these 20 image URLs and give me links".
• API: POST https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/phaux~bulk-file-downloader/run-sync-get-dataset-items with {"urls": ["https://www.python.org/static/img/python-logo.png"]} returns the file list directly.
• Every input and output field is described in the input and dataset schemas.

Data source and compliance

• Downloads only the URLs you provide. It never crawls, never follows links inside files or pages, and never logs in.
• You are responsible for having the right to download and store the files (copyright and licence terms of the source).
• Video and social platforms are refused (YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, X/Twitter, Vimeo and similar), because their terms don't allow downloading their media with third-party tools.
• robots.txt is honoured (RFC 9309) for the user agent PhauxFileDownloader; disallowed files are listed as robots_disallowed.
• Polite pacing: one request at a time per host, at least requestIntervalSecs apart (default 0.5 s). After an HTTP 429 a host is not contacted again in that run. No proxies, no IP rotation, and no attempts to get around bot protection.
• Only public http(s) hosts are fetched; private and internal addresses are refused on every redirect hop.

Limits

• Up to 100,000 URLs and 200 MB per file per run. Whole files are held in memory while being stored, so large size limits download fewer files in parallel; raise the run memory (up to 4 GB) for big files.
• Files are kept for the data retention period of your Apify plan; download what you need to keep.
• Pages that need JavaScript or a login to reveal the file can't be downloaded; use direct file links.

FAQ

• "html_response"? The URL returned a web page instead of a file, often a login, cookie-consent or error page. Use the direct file link, or switch on Store HTML pages too if you really want the page.
• How do I download everything at once? Open the run's key-value store in Console and export it, or loop over fileUrl in the dataset.
• Can I keep the original file names? fileName holds the original name; the key adds a sequence number and a short hash so names never collide.
• Something isn't working? Open an issue on the Issues tab with the run ID.