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🚀 Y Combinator Startup & Jobs Scraper v1 — Official YC Data, No API Key

Extract real startup data from Y Combinator’s public API and workatastartup.com.
Get company profiles, job listings, founder details, funding info, batch, valuation, and more — without any API key. Perfect for investors, job seekers, market researchers, and data analysts.

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💡 What is Y Combinator Startup & Jobs Scraper?

Y Combinator Startup & Jobs Scraper is a powerful automation tool that extracts publicly available startup data directly from Y Combinator’s official endpoints:

• https://www.workatastartup.com/companies – company list + current jobs
• https://api.ycombinator.com/v0.1/companies – YC company metadata (batch, valuation, founders, etc.)
• https://www.workatastartup.com/jobs – detailed job listings

No authentication, no API key, no rate limits (but respectful delays are applied). The scraper can:

• Search for startups by keyword, industry, batch, remote/hiring filters.
• Fetch specific companies by slug (e.g., airbnb, stripe, dropbox).
• Extract rich metadata – description, website, team size, batch, valuation, total raised, stage, location, logo, HN link.
• List open jobs – title, salary range, location, required skills, job URL.
• List founders – names, LinkedIn URLs, titles.

All data is returned as clean JSON, ready for dashboards, CRM enrichment, or investment research.

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📦 What Data Can You Extract?

🧩 Data Type	📋 Description
🏢 Company Profile	Name, slug, description, website, industry, subindustry, team size, batch, status, stage
💰 Funding & Valuation	Valuation, total raised, country, city
🖼️ Logo & Media	Logo URL, HN discussion URL
👥 Founders	Full name, LinkedIn URL, title
💼 Open Jobs	Job title, salary range, location, remote flag, required skills, job URL
🏷️ Tags & Categories	Industry tags (e.g., AI, Fintech, SaaS)
📊 Metadata	Data source (companies, yc_api, html), processing timestamp

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⚙️ Key Features

• Official YC Data – Uses Y Combinator’s public API (no reverse engineering).
• No API Key Required – Completely free to use (respectful rate limits applied).
• Search & Direct Fetch – Search by keyword/industry/batch or fetch specific company slugs.
• Rich Filters – Remote‑only, hiring‑only, industry, batch.
• Job Extraction – Captures salary, location, skills, and job URL for each open position.
• Founder Intelligence – Names and LinkedIn profiles (when available).
• Residential Proxy Ready – Avoid IP bans when scraping at scale.
• Clean JSON Output – Structured, documented schema.

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📥 Input Parameters

The actor accepts a JSON object with the following fields:

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
company_slugs	array or string	No	–	List of company slugs (e.g., ["airbnb", "stripe"]). Can be comma‑ or newline‑separated string.
search_query	string	No	–	Keyword to search companies (e.g., "AI", "fintech").
industry	string	No	–	Filter by industry (e.g., "SaaS", "Healthcare").
batch	string	No	–	Filter by YC batch (e.g., W24, S23).
remote_only	boolean	No	false	Show only companies with remote jobs.
hiring_only	boolean	No	false	Show only companies that are currently hiring.
max_results	integer	No	20	Maximum number of companies to return.
proxyConfiguration	object	No	–	Apify proxy configuration. Residential proxies recommended for large runs.

Example Input (Search Mode)

{
  "search_query": "AI",
  "industry": "SaaS",
  "batch": "W24",
  "remote_only": true,
  "hiring_only": true,
  "max_results": 10,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true,
    "apifyProxyGroups": ["RESIDENTIAL"]
  }
}

Example Input (Direct Fetch by Slug)

{
  "company_slugs": ["airbnb", "stripe", "dropbox"],
  "max_results": 10
}

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📤 Output Format

Each company is returned as a JSON object. Fields vary slightly depending on the data source, but the core schema is consistent.

Company Object Fields

Field	Type	Description
data_source	string	companies, yc_api, company_detail, or html.
id	integer	Internal YC company ID (if available).
name	string	Company name.
slug	string	URL slug (e.g., airbnb).
website	string	Company website URL.
description	string	Short description (one‑liner or long description).
industry	string	Primary industry.
subindustry	string	Sub‑industry (if available).
team_size	integer	Number of employees (approx).
batch	string	YC batch (e.g., W24).
status	string	Active, Acquired, Inactive, etc.
is_hiring	boolean	Whether the company has open jobs.
valuation	string	Valuation (if disclosed).
total_raised	string	Total funding raised.
stage	string	Funding stage (e.g., Seed, Series A).
country	string	Country of headquarters.
city	string	City of headquarters.
logo_url	string	URL to company logo.
hn_url	string	Hacker News discussion link.
jobs	array	List of open job postings (see below).
founders	array	List of founders (see below).
tags	array	Industry/topic tags.
processed_at	string	ISO timestamp of extraction.
source_url	string	Slug or name used as identifier.
status_result	string	success or not_found.

Job Object Structure

Field	Type	Description
id	integer	Job ID.
title	string	Job title.
salary_range	string	e.g., "$120K - $180K".
location	string	City or "Remote".
type	string	e.g., Full-time, Contract.
remote	boolean	Remote friendly.
skills	array	Required skills/tags.
job_url	string	Direct application link.

Founder Object Structure

Field	Type	Description
full_name	string	Founder’s full name.
linkedin	string	LinkedIn profile URL (if available).
title	string	Title/role at the company.

Example Output

[
  {
    "data_source": "companies",
    "id": 64,
    "name": "Y Combinator",
    "slug": "ycombinator",
    "website": "https://www.ycombinator.com",
    "description": "A startup accelerator that funds and mentors early-stage companies.",
    "industry": "Venture Capital",
    "subindustry": "Accelerator",
    "team_size": 100,
    "batch": null,
    "status": "Active",
    "is_hiring": true,
    "valuation": null,
    "total_raised": null,
    "stage": null,
    "country": "USA",
    "city": "Mountain View",
    "logo_url": "https://...",
    "hn_url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=123456",
    "jobs": [
      {
        "id": 78637,
        "title": "Product Engineer - App ops",
        "salary_range": "$180K - $270K",
        "location": "San Francisco, CA, US",
        "type": "Full-time",
        "remote": false,
        "skills": ["React", "Ruby on Rails", "PostgreSQL"],
        "job_url": "https://www.workatastartup.com/jobs/78637"
      }
    ],
    "founders": [
      {
        "full_name": "Paul Graham",
        "linkedin": "",
        "title": "Co-founder"
      },
      {
        "full_name": "Jessica Livingston",
        "linkedin": "https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessicalivingston1",
        "title": "Co-founder"
      }
    ],
    "tags": ["startup", "accelerator"],
    "processed_at": "2026-04-04T12:00:00Z",
    "source_url": "ycombinator",
    "status_result": "success"
  }
]

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🛠 How to Use on Apify

1. Create a task with this actor.
2. Provide input – either a list of company slugs or search parameters.
3. Configure proxies – optional but recommended for large‑scale runs.
4. Run – the actor will fetch data and push it to the Dataset.
5. Export – download results as JSON, CSV, or Excel.

Running via API

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/your-username~yc-startup-scraper/runs" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_TOKEN" \
  -d '{
    "search_query": "fintech",
    "batch": "W24",
    "max_results": 10
  }'

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🎯 Use Cases

• Investor Research – Identify promising YC startups by batch, industry, or funding stage.
• Job Aggregation – Build a job board focused on YC‑backed companies.
• Competitive Intelligence – Track hiring trends, salary ranges, and skill demands.
• Founder Database – Enrich CRM with founder names and LinkedIn profiles.
• Market Analysis – Study which industries are most active in recent YC batches.
• Data Enrichment – Add startup metadata to existing datasets.

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❓ Frequently Asked Questions

Q1. Do I need a Y Combinator API key?

No. This scraper uses the public APIs that power workatastartup.com and the YC company directory. No authentication required.

Q2. Is the data real?

Yes. All data comes directly from Y Combinator’s official public endpoints. It is the same data you see when visiting workatastartup.com.

Q3. Can I get historical data (older batches)?

Yes. The API returns companies from all batches. You can filter by batch (e.g., W15, S10) to get older startups.

Q4. Why do I need residential proxies?

For small runs (under 50 companies), proxies are optional. For large‑scale scraping (hundreds of companies), residential proxies help avoid IP‑based rate limiting. Datacenter IPs may be blocked by Cloudflare.

Q5. What happens if a company slug is not found?

The actor returns a status_result: "not_found" object with only basic fields. The run continues for other slugs.

Q6. Can I extract full job descriptions?

The job description is not directly available via the API. However, you can combine this actor with a job detail scraper (using the job_url field) to fetch full descriptions.

Q7. How accurate is the team size?

Team size is as reported by the company on their YC profile. It may not be real‑time, but it is usually up‑to‑date for active startups.

Q8. How fast is the scraper?

Search returns up to 20 companies in 5–10 seconds. Direct fetching of 10 specific slugs takes 10–20 seconds (including delays).

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