# Capterra Software Directory Scraper (`scrapyx/capterra-software-scraper`) Actor

Scrapes B2B software listings from Capterra by category — name, star rating, review count, description and logo for every product in any of Capterra's 1,000+ software categories.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/scrapyx/capterra-software-scraper.md
- **Developed by:** [Ibnu Adzim](https://apify.com/scrapyx) (community)
- **Categories:** Lead generation
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

from $0.84 / 1,000 results

This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events.
Since this Actor supports Apify Store discounts, the price gets lower the higher subscription plan you have.

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

## Capterra Software Directory Scraper

Scrapes B2B software listings from **[Capterra](https://www.capterra.com)**
(Gartner-owned) by category — 1,000+ categories, hundreds to thousands of
products each.

Public data only. No login, no cookies, no browser.

### What you get

Two record types share one dataset, told apart by `recordType`.

#### `PRODUCT` — one row per listing

`productName`, star `rating`, `reviewCount`, a one-line `description` and
`logoUrl`, plus the canonical `productUrl` — resolved from the card's real
`/p/{id}/...` link, not the paid-clickout redirect some cards show instead
(see `CRAWLING_METHOD.md`).

#### `SEARCH_SUMMARY` — one row per category

Pages fetched and how many products came back.

#### `ERROR` — one row per input that could not be processed

Every input maps to at least one row, so nothing disappears silently.

### Input

| Field | What it does |
| --- | --- |
| **Categories** | Capterra category slugs, e.g. `project-management-software`, `customer-relationship-management-software` — checked each run against a live fetch of Capterra's own category index (1,000+ slugs); an unrecognised one is refused, not silently mismatched |
| **Max products per category** | `0` = unlimited |
| **Min interval between requests** | the speed control — 0.6s default |

#### Example

```json
{
  "categories": ["project-management-software", "customer-relationship-management-software"],
  "maxItems": 100
}
```

### Notes on reliability

- **Cloudflare, narrow TLS-fingerprint gate.** Of 6 profiles tested cold,
  only `firefox133` passed (200); everything else — including the
  seemingly-adjacent `firefox135` — got a clean 403. This actor always
  uses `firefox133`.
- **Category input is validated live**, not against a hardcoded list —
  Capterra adds categories over time, and this actor fetches the real
  current list from `/categories/` at the start of every run.
- **Pagination is honest** — Capterra answers a clean 404 past the real
  last page rather than clamping back to page 1.

### Known limits

- **Category browse only, no free-text search.** `/search` is the one path
  Capterra's `robots.txt` disallows for the general crawler group; category
  listing pages are a richer, less ad-heavy surface anyway.
- **No review-text scraping.** This actor returns the directory listing
  (rating, review count, description) — not individual review text from
  each product's review page.

# Actor input Schema

## `categories` (type: `array`):

Capterra category slugs, e.g. 'project-management-software', 'accounting-software', 'customer-relationship-management-software'. Checked each run against a live fetch of Capterra's own /categories/ index (1,000+ categories) — an unrecognised slug is refused with the real count rather than silently returning the wrong page. Browse https://www.capterra.com/categories/ for the full list.

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

Stop paginating a category after this many products. Set to 0 for unlimited.

## `maxConcurrency` (type: `integer`):

How many requests may be in flight at once, across all categories. This absorbs latency variance; it is NOT the throttle — the crawl rate is set by 'Minimum interval between requests' below.

## `minRequestInterval` (type: `number`):

The actual speed control: the shortest gap between two requests to Capterra, across all workers.

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

Capterra sits behind Cloudflare — only the 'firefox133' TLS fingerprint got past it during recon (chrome124, safari17\_0, safari184, firefox135 and chrome99\_android all got a clean 403). Residential proxy is the cloud default.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "categories": [
    "project-management-software",
    "customer-relationship-management-software"
  ],
  "maxItems": 100,
  "maxConcurrency": 4,
  "minRequestInterval": 0.6,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true,
    "apifyProxyGroups": [
      "RESIDENTIAL"
    ]
  }
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `items` (type: `string`):

One row per scraped record. See the dataset's default view for field definitions.

# 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 = {
    "categories": [
        "project-management-software",
        "customer-relationship-management-software"
    ]
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("scrapyx/capterra-software-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 = { "categories": [
        "project-management-software",
        "customer-relationship-management-software",
    ] }

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("scrapyx/capterra-software-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 '{
  "categories": [
    "project-management-software",
    "customer-relationship-management-software"
  ]
}' |
apify call scrapyx/capterra-software-scraper --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,scrapyx/capterra-software-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/fmpwB6fDo1EkRRNEK/builds/fzeM3QgnzKkn26MiJ/openapi.json