USASpending Awards Scraper

What does USASpending Awards Scraper do?

USASpending Awards Scraper queries the official USAspending.gov spending_by_award API and returns flat federal award rows — award ID, recipient, UEI, amount, agency, dates, and detail URL.

Defaults to contracts / IDVs (A–D) over the last 30 days, so fresh GovCon intel works out of the box. Optional agency, recipient, NAICS, and keyword filters.

Not affiliated with the U.S. Department of the Treasury. Spending data may be reused commercially per USAspending licensing, subject to Dun & Bradstreet limitations.

Why this Actor?

• 🏛 Official API — POST api.usaspending.gov/api/v2/search/spending_by_award/
• ⏱ Recent-by-default — last 30 days → today (not a stale FY dump)
• 🎯 Agency + recipient + NAICS — first-class filters for BD workflows
• 🔒 Contracts/IDVs default — avoids assistance awards that may list individuals
• 🔁 Deduped by awardId|generatedInternalId
• 💵 $0.0015 per successful award. Error rows are not charged.

What data can you extract?

Field	Description
awardId, generatedInternalId	Award identifiers
recipientName, recipientUei	Recipient
awardAmount, startDate, endDate	Value & period
awardingAgency, description	Agency / description (search often null)
awardType, subaward	Type / mode flags
detailUrl	USAspending award page

---

How to scrape USASpending awards

1. Open USASpending Awards Scraper.
2. Prefer Agency (e.g. Department of Defense) and/or Recipient over broad keywords.
3. Optionally set NAICS, Keywords, and date range (defaults: last 30 days).
4. Keep Award types at A,B,C,D unless you intentionally need assistance.
5. Set Max items and run (API can be slow — Actor timeout is generous).
6. Export or consume via Apify API.

---

Input

Field	Required	Default	Description
keywords	no	[]	→ filters.keywords
naics	no	[]	→ filters.naics_codes
agency	no	"" (prefill DoD example)	Toptier awarding agency name
recipient	no	""	→ recipient_search_text array
awardTypes	no	A,B,C,D	Contracts/IDVs
startDate / endDate	no	last 30d → today	YYYY-MM-DD
subawards	no	false	Subawards mode
fetchDetails	no	false	GET /awards/{id}/ hydrate
maxItems	no	50	Cap (deduped)

Example input

{
  "agency": "Department of Defense",
  "recipient": "Boeing",
  "naics": ["336411"],
  "maxItems": 50
}

Recent awards (defaults)

{
  "agency": "Department of Defense",
  "awardTypes": ["A", "B", "C", "D"],
  "maxItems": 20
}

---

Billing note

Only default-dataset success awards are charged. Error rows are not charged (named errors dataset / logs).

Sample output

{
  "recordType": "award",
  "awardId": "DENA0003525",
  "generatedInternalId": "CONT_AWD_DENA0003525_8900_-NONE-_-NONE-",
  "recipientName": "NATIONAL TECHNOLOGY & ENGINEERING SOLUTIONS OF SANDIA, LLC",
  "recipientUei": "LUJEPCRRT377",
  "awardAmount": 43198566451.99,
  "startDate": "2017-01-18",
  "endDate": "2027-04-30",
  "awardingAgency": "Department of Energy",
  "description": "IGF::CL,CT::IGF CONTRACT AWARD DE-NA0003525 TO THE NATIONAL TECHNOLOGY&ENGINEERING SOLUTIONS OF SANDIA, LLC (NTESS) FOR THE MANAGEMENT AND OPERATION OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY, NATIONAL NUCLEAR SECURITY ADMINISTRATION'S SANDIA NATIONAL LABORATORIES (SNL)",
  "awardType": null,
  "subaward": false,
  "detailUrl": "https://www.usaspending.gov/award/CONT_AWD_DENA0003525_8900_-NONE-_-NONE-"
}

Note: search often returns description: null — enable fetchDetails when you need hydrated text (still one PPE charge).

---

How much does it cost?

Event	Price
Actor start	~$0.00005
Dataset item (successful award only)	$0.0015
Error / diagnostic rows	Not charged

Run	Approx. cost
1 start + 200 awards	≈ $0.30
1 start + 1,000 awards	≈ $1.50

Mark-approved FREE list from PPE_PRICING.md. Error rows are not charged.

---

Use cases

• 🛡 GovCon BD — recent DoD / agency award watches by recipient or NAICS
• ✅ Compliance / diligence — award history pulls
• 📰 Journalism — structured federal spending slices
• 🤖 Agents — scheduled award feeds

---

Limitations

• Not SAM.gov opportunities — different dataset / Actor
• API latency is variable (seconds to ~60s+); Actor uses long timeouts + retries
• Search field names are spaced in the API; we emit camelCase
• Default award types skip assistance (may list individual persons)
• Do not market bulk recipient/address fields as a D&B substitute

---

Legal & licensing

Per USAspending About:

Data is available to copy, adapt, redistribute, or otherwise use for non-commercial or for commercial purposes, subject to the Limitation on Permissible Use of Dun & Bradstreet, Inc. Data.

See https://www.usaspending.gov/db_info for D&B Open Data bulk-share limits.
API: https://api.usaspending.gov/

---

FAQ

Why last 30 days by default?

Fresh awards are what BD users need; override startDate/endDate for historical pulls.

Can I pull grants to individuals?

You can change awardTypes, but v1 defaults to contracts/IDVs to reduce personal-recipient exposure.

Is this SAM.gov?

No — USASpending awards, not SAM opportunity postings.

---

SEO keywords

usaspending scraper, usaspending api, federal awards scraper, federal contracts data, DoD awards API, recipient UEI awards, NAICS federal spending, govcon award history