Google Play Scraper: Apps, Search & Reviews

Google Play Scraper gets app details, search results and reviews from the Google Play Store in one Actor and one run. Give it package names (com.spotify.music), Play URLs or search terms. It returns clean JSON: rating and 1–5★ histogram, installs, price, in-app purchases, ads, category, content rating, version, update date, description, screenshots and similar apps. For reviews you get the review text, stars, helpful votes, app version, date and the developer's reply. Most review scrapers re-download the same reviews every day. This one has a monitoring mode: schedule it, and each run outputs (and charges) only the reviews posted since the last run. When an app can't be scraped, you get a clear reason and the other apps continue, so one bad id never kills the run. No login, no browser, no proxy needed by default.

What data can you get?

App details (type: "app")	Reviews (type: "review")
Title, short description, full description (plain text)	Review id and link
Developer name, Play developer id, developer page, website	Reviewer's public display name
Average rating, number of ratings and written reviews	Stars (1–5)
Rating histogram (1★–5★ counts)	Review text
Installs ("1,000,000,000+"), minimum installs, Google's install figure	Helpful votes (thumbs up)
Price, currency, free flag, in-app purchase range, contains ads	App version the review was written for
Category, category id, tags	Review date (ISO 8601)
Content rating and descriptors	Developer reply text and date
Release date, last update, current version, required Android version	App id and title, country, language, sort order
What's new (release notes)
Icon, feature graphic, screenshots, promo video
Similar apps, more apps by the same developer (ids)
Search query and rank (for apps found by search)

The developer's e-mail address, phone number and postal address are not collected. Neither are reviewers' avatars or account ids.

Use cases

• Review monitoring: get new 1★ reviews in Slack every morning, track complaints after a release, and measure how fast support replies.
• App store optimisation (ASO): follow ratings, histograms, installs and release notes for your app and your competitors.
• Competitor research: search a keyword ("habit tracker", "budget app") and compare the top apps on price, rating, installs, monetisation and update frequency.
• Sentiment analysis and AI: feed thousands of reviews into an LLM or a BI dashboard, by language and country.
• Market and investment research: track install tiers and rating trends across a category.

How to use it

1. Add apps to Apps: com.spotify.music or https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.spotify.music.
2. Choose how many reviews you want per app, the sort order (newest, most relevant, rating) and, if you like, a star filter.
3. Optionally add Search queries to find apps by keyword.
4. Set Country (us, gb, de...) and Language (en, de, pt-BR...).
5. Click Start, then download the results as JSON, CSV or Excel, or read them through the API.

Example: the 100 newest reviews and app details for two apps

{
    "appIds": ["com.spotify.music", "https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.duolingo"],
    "includeAppDetails": true,
    "includeReviews": true,
    "maxReviewsPerApp": 100,
    "reviewsSort": "newest",
    "country": "us",
    "language": "en"
}

Example: daily monitor of new 1★ reviews (schedule it daily)

{
    "appIds": ["com.yourcompany.app"],
    "includeAppDetails": false,
    "includeReviews": true,
    "onlyNewReviews": true,
    "reviewsStarFilter": "1",
    "maxReviewsPerApp": 500,
    "monitorKey": "support-1-star",
    "country": "us",
    "language": "en"
}

Example: the top 20 apps for a keyword, with full details

{
    "searchQueries": ["habit tracker", "meditation"],
    "maxSearchResults": 20,
    "includeReviews": false,
    "country": "gb",
    "language": "en"
}

Field	What it does
appIds	Package names or Google Play app URLs.
includeAppDetails	Output one app item per app (default on). Switch it off to get reviews only.
includeReviews	Scrape reviews of the listed apps (default on).
maxReviewsPerApp	Review limit per app (default 100). 0 = no limit.
reviewsSort	newest, mostRelevant or rating.
reviewsStarFilter	all or 1–5.
onlyNewReviews	Monitoring mode: output only reviews not output by earlier runs of this monitor.
monitorKey	Name of the monitor, so you can run several independent monitors on the same apps.
searchQueries	Keywords to search on Google Play.
maxSearchResults	Apps per search query (default 10; 0 = all on the results page, about 20–30).
searchResultsOnly	Output search results straight from the results page, without opening each app (faster; some fields are null).
reviewsForSearchResults	Also scrape reviews of the apps found by search.
country, language	Google Play's gl and hl. Prices, availability and search results follow the country. Reviews follow the language.
proxyConfiguration	Off by default. Turn on Apify Proxy if Google rate-limits your runs.

Output example

Real output from the default input (com.spotify.music, 20 newest reviews, US English), shortened:

[
    {
        "type": "app",
        "id": "gplay:app:com.spotify.music:us:en",
        "appId": "com.spotify.music",
        "url": "https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.spotify.music&hl=en&gl=us",
        "title": "Spotify: Music and Podcasts",
        "summary": "Listen to songs, play podcasts, create playlists and discover music you'll love",
        "description": "With the Spotify music and podcast app, you can play millions of songs, albums and original podcasts for free. We have even added audiobooks, so you can enjoy t…",
        "developer": "Spotify AB",
        "developerId": "Spotify AB",
        "developerUrl": "https://play.google.com/store/apps/developer?id=Spotify+AB",
        "developerWebsite": "https://www.spotify.com",
        "privacyPolicyUrl": "https://www.spotify.com/legal/privacy-policy/",
        "score": 4.3491,
        "scoreText": "4.3",
        "ratingsCount": 36580138,
        "reviewsCount": 1857960,
        "histogram": { "1": 3719222, "2": 1068443, "3": 1310623, "4": 3106149, "5": 27375685 },
        "installs": "1,000,000,000+",
        "minInstalls": 1000000000,
        "realInstalls": 3181010787,
        "price": 0,
        "currency": "USD",
        "priceText": "Free",
        "free": true,
        "offersIAP": true,
        "iapRange": "$4.99 - $203.88 per item",
        "containsAds": true,
        "genre": "Music & Audio",
        "genreId": "MUSIC_AND_AUDIO",
        "categories": [{ "name": "Music & Audio", "id": "MUSIC_AND_AUDIO" }],
        "contentRating": "Teen",
        "contentRatingDescription": null,
        "released": "2014-05-27T13:12:17.255Z",
        "updated": "2026-11-02T11:59:56.030Z",
        "version": "Varies with device",
        "androidVersion": "Varies with device",
        "recentChanges": "We’re always making changes and improvements to Spotify. To make sure you don’t miss a thing, just keep your Updates turned on.",
        "icon": "https://play-lh.googleusercontent.com/IzQgYCcnCFCD08GR-3bdtcT8xzOvrNkC84avGT5CwTX2VIqmTmKKJcP_Cd4JoBOdmCMlTndlOzV6hrthg2fOWA",
        "headerImage": "https://play-lh.googleusercontent.com/WdedaGD6EAXZgy88wZM97aIcenQ5Cqzu_IUWBMMalkZmVe2lhv_3YqIUh-6pFqLv27kZ44cQX3qxyZTXHH-S91Q",
        "screenshots": ["https://play-lh.googleusercontent.com/c1jnjL-9CIFlwlTMX3xNyeo8aEH39sNuC5zpTHhfW8keGxQE3TBMRX9Rm3VqM3E03Cyl9AqtnxuKvxJpcW0WCA", "…"],
        "video": null,
        "similarApps": ["com.pinterest", "com.google.android.apps.youtube.music", "com.snapchat.android", "com.netflix.mediaclient", "com.duolingo", "com.zhiliaoapp.musically"],
        "moreByDeveloper": ["com.spotify.tv.android", "com.spotify.s4a", "fm.anchor.android", "com.spotify.kids", "com.whosampled"],
        "fullDetails": true,
        "searchQuery": null,
        "searchRank": null,
        "country": "us",
        "language": "en",
        "scrapedAt": "2026-11-02T13:31:04.470Z"
    },
    {
        "type": "review",
        "id": "gplay:review:65362f66-c012-4d61-a56a-744f928f0f3a",
        "reviewId": "65362f66-c012-4d61-a56a-744f928f0f3a",
        "appId": "com.spotify.music",
        "appTitle": "Spotify: Music and Podcasts",
        "url": "https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.spotify.music&reviewId=65362f66-c012-4d61-a56a-744f928f0f3a",
        "userName": "Robert Murcott",
        "score": 1,
        "text": "app very laggy and slow.",
        "thumbsUp": 0,
        "appVersion": "9.1.94.1929",
        "date": "2026-11-01T12:58:51.064Z",
        "replyText": "Hi. Thanks for reporting. Have you tried a quick reinstall? If that doesn't help, we'd recommend reaching out to our Customer Service at support.spotify.com. Just search “Contact Us”, and they'll be happy to help.",
        "replyDate": "2026-02-22T15:30:54.841Z",
        "sort": "newest",
        "country": "us",
        "language": "en",
        "scrapedAt": "2026-11-02T13:31:05.763Z"
    }
]

The dataset has three views: Reviews, Apps and App details (histogram, monetisation, compatibility). A RUN_SUMMARY record in the key-value store lists the status of every app and search (ok, not found, no reviews, blocked), plus counts and request statistics.

Pricing

Pay per event: you pay only for what you get. There is no subscription and no fee per start beyond Apify's standard tiny run-start charge.

Event	Price	When it's charged
review	$0.0001 per review ($0.10 per 1,000)	Each review saved to the dataset
app	$0.002 per app ($2 per 1,000)	Each app saved to the dataset, with full details or as a search-result summary

Worked examples:

• 1,000 reviews ≈ $0.10. 100,000 reviews ≈ $10.
• Default input (1 app + 20 reviews) ≈ $0.004.
• Daily monitoring of 10 apps with about 30 new reviews per app per day ≈ 300 reviews ≈ $0.03 per day, about $0.90 per month. A day without new reviews costs nothing beyond the run start.
• Top 20 apps for 5 keywords with full details = 100 apps ≈ $0.20.

Set Maximum cost per run in the run options. The Actor stops cleanly when the budget is reached, without overshooting it.

Monitoring new reviews

1. Turn on Only new reviews, set Max reviews per app high enough for a day's reviews (e.g. 500), and give the monitor a name.
2. Create a Schedule in Apify Console (e.g. daily at 08:00) for this input.
3. Connect the dataset to Slack, e-mail, Google Sheets or a webhook (see Integrations).

The first run outputs the newest reviews up to your limit and remembers them. After that, each run outputs only the reviews posted since. Memory is kept per monitor, app, country, language and star filter in the named key-value store google-play-scraper-state. Google Play publishes some reviews with a delay, so every run looks back up to 48 hours and skips reviews it has already output. A late review is still caught, and nothing is output twice. If more new reviews arrive than your limit, or a run is cut short, the next run picks up the rest, as long as they are within 48 hours of the newest review. If a reviewer edits a review, it gets a new date, and it is output once more with the new text.

Tips and limits

• Search depth: Google Play's web search shows about 20–30 apps per query, so that's the maximum per query. Use several related keywords to cover more.
• Reviews are per language: language: "de" returns reviews written in German. Run the Actor once per language you need.
• Country matters: prices, availability and search results follow country. An app that isn't available there is reported as "not found", and the other apps continue.
• Very large review exports: popular apps have millions of reviews. Use maxReviewsPerApp and a maximum cost per run. Pages hold up to 200 reviews each, so 100,000 reviews take about 500 requests.
• Review dates: date is the date of the review or of its last edit. That's why a developer reply can be older than the review it answers.
• No app size or permissions: Google Play's web pages no longer show app size, and permissions are not scraped.
• "Varies with device" is returned for version / androidVersion when Google shows no single value.
• Rate limits: the default speed (3 apps in parallel) works without a proxy in our tests. If Google answers HTTP 429 or a CAPTCHA, the run stops with a clear message instead of hammering. Turn on Apify Proxy and run again.
• Layout changes: Google changes its page data from time to time. The Actor reads each field from several places and falls back to the page's schema.org data, so a change usually costs a few fields rather than the whole run. If something looks wrong, please open an issue.

FAQ

Is it legal to scrape Google Play? This Actor reads only publicly available data that anyone can see in a browser without logging in. It does not collect personal contact data. Developer e-mails, phone numbers and addresses are skipped, and so are reviewer avatars and account ids. Reviewer display names are public, but they are still personal data in some jurisdictions (e.g. GDPR). You are responsible for using the data lawfully, for example for aggregated analysis, and for complying with Google's terms and the laws that apply to you. If in doubt, ask a lawyer.

Do I need a Google account, API key or proxy? No. A proxy is optional, for when Google rate-limits a run.

How is this different from other Google Play scrapers? One Actor does app details, search and reviews, with sort and star filters. Monitoring mode charges only for new reviews. Failures are reported honestly: a missing app or a block gets a clear status per app in RUN_SUMMARY, and the rest of the run continues and succeeds.

Can I get reviews for several countries or languages? Yes, with one run per country/language combination. Schedule several tasks if you need it regularly.

Why did my monitoring run output nothing? Then no new reviews were published since the last run. The status message says "no new reviews since the last run", and you are not charged for reviews.

What does realInstalls mean? It's the install count Google embeds in the page next to the public tier ("1,000,000,000+"). Google doesn't document it, so treat it as an estimate.

Integrations

• API: start runs and fetch results with the Apify API or the JavaScript and Python clients. Use ?view=reviews or ?view=apps to get one item type.
• Make, Zapier, n8n: use the Apify modules to run the Actor and send new reviews to Slack, Sheets, Airtable, HubSpot or e-mail.
• Webhooks: trigger your own endpoint when a run finishes.
• MCP / AI agents: the Actor works as a tool through the Apify MCP server, so Claude, ChatGPT and other agents can pull Google Play data on demand.

Changelog

• 0.1 (November 2026): First release: app details, search (full or results-only), reviews with sort, star filter and pagination, monitoring mode for new reviews, pay per event (review, app).

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