# PriceCharting API Scraper (`rl1987/pricecharting-api-scraper`) Actor

Scrape PriceCharting's public app API — catalogue/keyword search with loose, CIB and new market prices for trading cards, video games, sports cards, comics, coins, LEGO and Funko; public marketplace offers for a product or seller; and popular autocomplete terms. Read-only public data.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/rl1987/pricecharting-api-scraper.md
- **Developed by:** [R.L.](https://apify.com/rl1987) (community)
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 0.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

from $5.00 / 1,000 dataset rows

This Actor is paid per event and usage. You are charged both the fixed price for specific events and for Apify platform usage.

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

## 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

## PriceCharting Scraper 🃏🎮 — catalogue prices, marketplace offers & search terms

**PriceCharting Scraper** reads PriceCharting's own app API directly, so it's **fast and reliable** —
no HTML parsing, no headless browser. Read-only public data: catalogue search with **loose / CIB /
new** market prices across trading cards, video games, sports cards, comics, coins, LEGO and Funko;
public marketplace offers; and popular search terms. Export to **JSON, CSV, Excel, or an API**.

#### Three modes

**`search`** (default) — keyword/catalogue search. Each row is a product with its loose, CIB
(complete-in-box) and new/sealed market prices (USD), console/set, category and image. Filter by
`broadCategory`, `consoleUid`, or `sort`.

**`offers`** — public marketplace listings for a `productId` (or a `seller`): price, condition,
status and the offer URL.

**`autocomplete`** — the popular search terms PriceCharting suggests for a `broadCategory`.

```jsonc
// catalogue prices for "charizard"
{ "mode": "search", "query": "charizard" }
// -> { "type":"product", "title":"Charizard #4", "console_name":"Pokemon Base Set",
//      "price_loose_usd":210.0, "price_cib_usd":420.0, "price_new_usd":1500.0, "currency":"USD" }

// marketplace offers for a product
{ "mode": "offers", "productId": "155156" }
// -> { "type":"offer", "title":"Super Mario 3D All-Stars", "price_usd":85.0,
//      "condition_string":"Complete", "offer_status":"active", "offer_url":"https://www.pricecharting.com/..." }

// popular video-game search terms
{ "mode": "autocomplete", "broadCategory": "video-games" }
// -> { "type":"term", "term":"pokemon" }
```

Every row — product, offer and term — shares one flat schema with a `type` discriminator, so a mixed
export stays a single table; fields that don't apply to a row type are `null`.

### ⚙️ Input

| Field | Type | Default | Description |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `mode` | string | `search` | `search` = catalogue + prices. `offers` = marketplace listings. `autocomplete` = popular terms. |
| `query` | string | – | Search mode. Keyword to search, e.g. `charizard`. |
| `broadCategory` | string | – | Search filter and the **required** input for Autocomplete. One of trading-cards, video-games, sports-cards, comic-books, coins, lego-sets, funko-pops. |
| `consoleUid` | string | – | Search mode (optional). Scope to a console/set UID. |
| `sort` | string | – | Search mode (optional). Sort key. |
| `productId` | string | – | Offers mode. PriceCharting product id (e.g. `155156`). |
| `seller` | string | – | Offers mode (optional). List a seller's offers instead of a product's. |
| `offerStatus` | string | – | Offers mode (optional). Filter by status. |
| `maxItems` | integer | `200` | 0 = all available. |
| `proxyConfiguration` | object | Apify datacenter | On by default; the API isn't geo-gated, datacenter is enough. |

### 📤 Output

A flat record per product / offer / term. Product rows carry `title`, `console_name`, `console_uid`,
`category`, `image`, and `price_loose_usd` / `price_cib_usd` / `price_new_usd` (+ `currency`).
Every row carries a **reference `url`** to its pricecharting.com page for data QA — products link to `/game/<id>` (plus `offers_url` = `/offers?product=<id>`), offers to the listing, terms to the search page.
Offer rows carry `price_usd`, `condition_string`, `offer_status`, `offer_url`, `is_sold`,
`sale_time`, `cert_id`/`grade_co_id`. Term rows carry `term` + `broad_category`.

### 📌 Good to know

- **Prices are USD dollars** (e.g. `210.0` = $210.00) — PriceCharting condition IDs map to
  `price_loose` (loose), `price_new` (new & sealed) and `price_cib` (complete-in-box), verified
  against the site.

- **No login needed for the public surface** (search, offers, autocomplete). There is no antibot or
  request signing on these endpoints.

- **Detailed sales history is not available here.** PriceCharting's `api/item` sales-comps
  (sales1..sales22 / volume / graded prices) and the consoles/forex endpoints require a **logged-in
  account** with no guest-token path, so the actor does not expose them (an honest ceiling rather
  than a fabricated result). The same sales data is published on PriceCharting's server-rendered
  `/game/<console>/<slug>` web pages if you need it.

- Prices and listings are point-in-time.

- **UPC lookup:** in search mode, set `upc` (e.g. `045496590741`) to resolve the exact product by barcode — no keyword needed. Closes the gap vs the paid `/api/product?upc=` (which needs a token).

# Actor input Schema

## `mode` (type: `string`):

What to scrape. Search = catalogue search with loose/CIB/new market prices. Offers = public marketplace listings for a product or seller. Autocomplete = popular search terms for a broad category.

## `query` (type: `string`):

Search mode. Keyword to search the catalogue, e.g. "charizard" or "super mario 3d all-stars".

## `upc` (type: `string`):

Search mode. Look up the exact product by its UPC/barcode (e.g. 045496590741). Works with no keyword — returns the matching product with loose/CIB/new prices.

## `broadCategory` (type: `string`):

Search filter and the required input for Autocomplete mode. One of PriceCharting's broad categories.

## `consoleUid` (type: `string`):

Search mode (optional). Scope results to a specific console/set by its PriceCharting UID.

## `sort` (type: `string`):

Search mode. Sort order for results (verified against the API — lowest-price is not supported).

## `productId` (type: `string`):

Offers mode. PriceCharting product id to list marketplace offers for (e.g. 155156).

## `seller` (type: `string`):

Offers mode (optional). List offers from a specific seller instead of a product.

## `offerStatus` (type: `string`):

Offers mode. Which marketplace listings to return: available (live), sold (completed comps), or pending.

## `maxItems` (type: `integer`):

Maximum number of rows to return. 0 = all available.

## `proxyConfiguration` (type: `object`):

Apify Proxy is ON by default (datacenter). The PriceCharting API is not geo-gated, so datacenter is enough; a proxy keeps requests off the actor's shared egress under load.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "mode": "search",
  "query": "charizard",
  "sort": "popularity",
  "productId": "155156",
  "offerStatus": "available",
  "maxItems": 200,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true
  }
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `results` (type: `string`):

No description

# 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 = {
    "query": "charizard",
    "productId": "155156",
    "proxyConfiguration": {
        "useApifyProxy": true
    }
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("rl1987/pricecharting-api-scraper").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 = {
    "query": "charizard",
    "productId": "155156",
    "proxyConfiguration": { "useApifyProxy": True },
}

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("rl1987/pricecharting-api-scraper").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 '{
  "query": "charizard",
  "productId": "155156",
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true
  }
}' |
apify call rl1987/pricecharting-api-scraper --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,rl1987/pricecharting-api-scraper"
        }
    }
}
```

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/l2WQymUl8rB30UGRD/builds/b08Uwghs0uMx4qzQq/openapi.json