# Website Tech Stack Detector — Technographics by Domain (`shelvick/website-tech-stack-detector`) Actor Detect the technologies a website runs — CMS, ecommerce platform, analytics, tag managers, JS frameworks, CDN, payment, and marketing tools. Give a list of company domains; get a normalized JSON tech profile per site for B2B sales targeting and competitive technographic research. - **URL**: https://apify.com/shelvick/website-tech-stack-detector.md - **Developed by:** [Scott Helvick](https://apify.com/shelvick) (community) - **Categories:** Developer tools, Lead generation - **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks - **User rating**: No ratings yet ## Pricing from $8.50 / 1,000 domain profileds 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/platform/actors/running/actors-in-store#pay-per-event ## What's an Apify Actor? Actors are a software tools running on the Apify platform, for all kinds of web data extraction and automation use cases. 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. In JavaScript/TypeScript projects, use official [JavaScript/TypeScript client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js.md): ```bash npm install apify-client ``` In Python projects, use official [Python client library](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python.md): ```bash pip install apify-client ``` In shell scripts, use [Apify CLI](https://docs.apify.com/cli/docs.md): ````bash # MacOS / Linux curl -fsSL https://apify.com/install-cli.sh | bash # Windows irm https://apify.com/install-cli.ps1 | iex ```bash In AI frameworks, you might use the [Apify MCP server](https://docs.apify.com/platform/integrations/mcp.md). If your project is in a different language, use 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 ## Website Tech Stack Detector — Technographics by Domain Find out what technology any website runs. Give this Actor a list of company domains and it returns a normalized JSON technology profile per site — the CMS, ecommerce platform, analytics and tag managers, JavaScript frameworks, CDN, payment providers, marketing and support tools, and more — each with the evidence that identified it. Built for B2B sales targeting, competitive research, and technographic datasets, and callable directly by an AI agent. ### What this does - Takes a list of **domains or URLs** (1–100 per run) and profiles each site's homepage. - Detects technologies across ~20 categories: **CMS** (WordPress, Drupal, Webflow, Wix, …), **ecommerce platform** (Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, BigCommerce, …), **analytics** (Google Analytics, Hotjar, Segment, Mixpanel, …), **tag managers**, **JavaScript frameworks** (React, Next.js, Vue, Angular, …), **CDN / hosting**, **web server / language**, **marketing automation** (HubSpot, Marketo, Klaviyo, …), **customer support / chat**, **advertising pixels**, **A/B testing**, **payment** (Stripe, PayPal, Braintree, …), **cookie consent**, **search**, and **video**. - Returns each detected technology with a **category**, a **confidence** (high for a specific signature like a script URL or generator tag; medium for a generic HTML pattern), and the **concrete evidence** that matched. - Groups results by category and gives a per-site **technology count** for fast scanning. - Profiles are **deterministic** — the same page yields the same result every time. No model guesses what a site "probably" runs. Use it to: - **Build B2B prospect lists** filtered by technology (e.g. "every site running Shopify and Klaviyo"). - **Score sales leads** by the tools they already use. - **Run competitive research** on what a set of competitors' sites are built with. - **Track migrations** — re-run a domain list over time to see platform changes. - **Feed an AI sales-research agent** structured technographic data without maintaining your own signature database. ### Why deterministic, signature-based detection matters Technographic data drives outreach and spend decisions, so a wrong answer is worse than no answer. Every technology this Actor reports is a verbatim signature match against the page's own markup — a script URL, a generator meta tag, a framework marker, a response header — and the matching evidence travels with each result so you can audit it. There is no language model in the detection path inventing a plausible-but-wrong stack. A useful side effect: because the work is fetch-plus-pattern-match with no inference bill, the cost floor is tiny, so the price reflects the lookup, not a model call. ### How it compares to the alternatives | Approach | Normalized categories | Evidence per match | Bulk by domain | Agent-callable | |---|---|---|---|---| | Subscription technology-lookup services | yes | rarely | yes | via their own API/plan | | Roll-your-own page parsing | you build it | you build it | you build it | you build it | | **Website Tech Stack Detector** | yes | yes | yes (1–100/run) | yes | The honest framing: you can parse pages and maintain a signature set yourself — this Actor is for when you'd rather not own that, and want a stable JSON contract you can point an agent or a pipeline at. Subscription technology databases are the alternative when you need a multi-year history or a firmographic overlay and don't mind a per-seat plan; this Actor is the better fit for on-demand, pay-per-domain lookups wired into your own workflow. ### Input | Field | Type | Required | Default | Description | |---|---|---|---|---| | `domains` | array of strings | yes | — | Company domains or full URLs to profile (1–100). Accepts `example.com`, `www.example.com`, or `https://example.com/path`; each is normalized to an https homepage fetch. | | `deepRender` | boolean | | `false` | Force a full JavaScript render on every domain to catch technologies injected by client-side scripts. Off by default — raw HTML already contains the loader tags for the large majority of technologies, and the fetch escalates to a render automatically when a site blocks the plain request. | One dataset record is produced per input domain. ### Output One record per domain. Nullable fields are `null` on a failed record. ```json { "identifier": "shopify.com", "status": "completed", "url": "https://www.shopify.com/", "domain": "shopify.com", "technologies": [ { "name": "Shopify", "category": "Ecommerce", "confidence": "high", "evidence": "URL: https://cdn.shopify.com/s/..." }, { "name": "Google Analytics", "category": "Analytics", "confidence": "high", "evidence": "URL: https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtag/js?id=G-..." } ], "categories": { "Ecommerce": ["Shopify"], "Analytics": ["Google Analytics"] }, "technologyCount": 2, "realizedTier": "basic", "error": null, "notice": "Technologies are inferred from publicly served page markup via signature matching; detection is best-effort and provided as-is, not a guarantee of what a site runs." } ```` A failed record carries `status: "failed"`, an `error` tag (e.g. `fetch-failed`, `empty-response`, `invalid-domain`), and an empty `technologies` list. ### Example Profile three companies' sites: ```json { "domains": ["shopify.com", "stripe.com", "wordpress.org"] } ``` ```bash curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/shelvick~website-tech-stack-detector/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=YOUR_TOKEN" \ -H "Content-Type: application/json" \ -d '{"domains":["shopify.com","stripe.com","wordpress.org"]}' ``` ```python from apify_client import ApifyClient client = ApifyClient("YOUR_TOKEN") run = client.actor("shelvick/website-tech-stack-detector").call( run_input={"domains": ["shopify.com", "stripe.com", "wordpress.org"]} ) for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items(): print(item["identifier"], item["technologyCount"], list((item.get("categories") or {}).keys())) ``` ### Calling from an AI agent **Apify MCP server (`mcp.apify.com`)** — the Actor is exposed as a callable tool whose input schema is self-documenting, so an LLM can construct a valid call from the tool description alone (domains in; technology profiles out). Pay per call via x402 (USDC on Base) or Skyfire managed tokens. **Apify SDK (Python)** — `from apify_client import ApifyClient`, then `client.actor("shelvick/website-tech-stack-detector").call(run_input=...)` and iterate the dataset (see above). **REST API** — `POST /v2/acts/shelvick~website-tech-stack-detector/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=...` for synchronous runs; the async `/runs` endpoint for large domain lists that may exceed the 5-minute sync window. ### Pricing Pay-per-event, billed only on success: one charge per domain that is fetched and analyzed, after its record is pushed to the dataset. Domains that fail to fetch — or that are too heavily bot-walled to reach — are **free**. Because billing is per domain, your domain-list length is your spend cap. See the **Pricing** tab on this Store page for the current per-domain rate and any active subscriber discounts. Design notes: [www.scotthelvick.com/tools/website-tech-stack-detector](https://www.scotthelvick.com/tools/website-tech-stack-detector) ### Behavior **Run-level failures (rare)** — input validation only: an empty `domains` list or more than 100 entries is rejected before any work. **Per-domain outcomes (common)** — each domain yields a record; failures are isolated and never charged: - `invalid-domain` — the input had no usable hostname. - `fetch-failed` — the site could not be reached (or is bot-walled beyond the rendered-fetch tier). - `challenge-blocked` — the fetch returned a bot-wall / CAPTCHA challenge page rather than the real site (only CDN/security markers were present), so it is reported as blocked instead of a misleading thin profile. - `empty-response` — the fetch returned no usable HTML. A domain that is reached successfully but matches no known signature returns `status: "completed"` with an empty technology list — a valid answer (the site uses none of the detected technologies), and it is charged like any successful profile. **Performance** — one homepage fetch per domain, raw HTML first with an automatic escalation to a rendered fetch when a site needs it. Domains are processed concurrently, so a small list finishes in seconds; a 100-domain list runs longer and may need the async endpoint rather than the 5-minute sync window. ### FAQ **Which technologies can it detect?** Around 95 technologies across ~20 categories — CMS, ecommerce platforms, analytics, tag managers, JavaScript frameworks, CDN/hosting, web servers and languages, marketing automation, support/chat, ad pixels, A/B testing, payment, cookie consent, search, and video. The set favors the highest-signal, most common technologies and grows over time. **Why did a site I know uses tool X not show it?** Some technologies are injected only after client-side scripts run; enable `deepRender` to force a full render. Others leave no detectable public signature, and a few sites are bot-walled beyond the rendered-fetch tier (those return a failed record and aren't charged). **What does "confidence" mean?** `high` = a specific signature matched (a third-party script URL, a generator meta tag, a response header, or a cookie). `medium` = a generic HTML pattern matched. Every result includes the exact evidence so you can verify it. **Can I pass full URLs, not just domains?** Yes — bare domains, `www.` hostnames, and full URLs are all accepted; each is normalized to an https homepage fetch. **Is this only the homepage?** Yes. One homepage fetch per domain covers site-wide technologies (most tags load on every page) and keeps the cost predictable. Per-page crawling is out of scope. ### What this doesn't do - **No deep crawl.** It profiles the homepage, not every page of a site. - **No technology history or version timelines.** It reports the current state, not when a site adopted or dropped a tool. - **No firmographics or contact data.** It returns the tech stack, not company size, revenue, or email addresses. - **No market-share rankings.** It profiles the domains you give it; it doesn't tell you how popular a technology is overall. - **No authenticated or paywalled pages.** Public homepage markup only. For an aggregated competitive landscape of *local* businesses (counts, ratings, saturation) use a local-market analysis Actor instead. For turning a list of URLs into arbitrary structured fields against your own schema, use a structured web-extraction Actor. For fetching the raw page content itself in multiple formats, use an adaptive page-fetching Actor. # Actor input Schema ## `domains` (type: `array`): Company website domains or full URLs to profile (1-100). Accepts bare domains ('example.com'), hostnames ('www.example.com'), or full URLs ('https://example.com/about'); each is normalized to an https homepage fetch. One JSON tech-profile record is produced per input, charged per domain successfully profiled. Use this for B2B sales targeting, competitive technographic research, or building a technology dataset across a list of companies. ## `deepRender` (type: `boolean`): When off (default), pages are fetched as raw HTML and only escalated to a JavaScript render if the site blocks or thins the plain request — the cheapest path. Turn on to force a full JavaScript render on every domain, which catches technologies injected dynamically by client-side scripts. Leave off for most bulk runs; raw HTML already contains the loader tags for the large majority of technologies. ## Actor input object example ```json { "domains": [ "shopify.com", "stripe.com", "wordpress.org" ], "deepRender": false } ``` # Actor output Schema ## `results` (type: `string`): Technology-profile records for this run (one per domain). # 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 '' with your token const client = new ApifyClient({ token: '', }); // Prepare Actor input const input = { "domains": [ "shopify.com", "stripe.com", "wordpress.org" ], "deepRender": false }; // Run the Actor and wait for it to finish const run = await client.actor("shelvick/website-tech-stack-detector").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 '' with your token. client = ApifyClient("") # Prepare the Actor input run_input = { "domains": [ "shopify.com", "stripe.com", "wordpress.org", ], "deepRender": False, } # Run the Actor and wait for it to finish run = client.actor("shelvick/website-tech-stack-detector").call(run_input=run_input) # Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any) print("💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/" + run["defaultDatasetId"]) for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items(): print(item) # 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start ``` ## CLI example ```bash echo '{ "domains": [ "shopify.com", "stripe.com", "wordpress.org" ], "deepRender": false }' | apify call shelvick/website-tech-stack-detector --silent --output-dataset ``` ## MCP server setup ```json { "mcpServers": { "apify": { "command": "npx", "args": [ "mcp-remote", "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=shelvick/website-tech-stack-detector", "--header", "Authorization: Bearer " ] } } } ``` ## OpenAPI specification ```json { "openapi": "3.0.1", "info": { "title": "Website Tech Stack Detector — Technographics by Domain", "description": "Detect the technologies a website runs — CMS, ecommerce platform, analytics, tag managers, JS frameworks, CDN, payment, and marketing tools. Give a list of company domains; get a normalized JSON tech profile per site for B2B sales targeting and competitive technographic research.", "version": "0.0", "x-build-id": "uQkifh2fKlcVSo7d8" }, "servers": [ { "url": "https://api.apify.com/v2" } ], "paths": { "/acts/shelvick~website-tech-stack-detector/run-sync-get-dataset-items": { "post": { "operationId": "run-sync-get-dataset-items-shelvick-website-tech-stack-detector", "x-openai-isConsequential": false, "summary": "Executes an Actor, waits for its completion, and returns Actor's dataset items in response.", "tags": [ "Run Actor" ], "requestBody": { "required": true, "content": { "application/json": { "schema": { "$ref": "#/components/schemas/inputSchema" } } } }, "parameters": [ { "name": "token", "in": "query", "required": true, "schema": { "type": "string" }, "description": "Enter your Apify token here" } ], "responses": { "200": { "description": "OK" } } } }, "/acts/shelvick~website-tech-stack-detector/runs": { "post": { "operationId": "runs-sync-shelvick-website-tech-stack-detector", "x-openai-isConsequential": false, "summary": "Executes an Actor and returns information about the initiated run in response.", "tags": [ "Run Actor" ], "requestBody": { "required": true, "content": { "application/json": { "schema": { "$ref": "#/components/schemas/inputSchema" } } } }, "parameters": [ { "name": "token", "in": "query", "required": true, "schema": { "type": "string" }, "description": "Enter your Apify token here" } ], "responses": { "200": { "description": "OK", "content": { "application/json": { "schema": { "$ref": "#/components/schemas/runsResponseSchema" } } } } } } }, "/acts/shelvick~website-tech-stack-detector/run-sync": { "post": { "operationId": "run-sync-shelvick-website-tech-stack-detector", "x-openai-isConsequential": false, "summary": "Executes an Actor, waits for completion, and returns the OUTPUT from Key-value store in response.", "tags": [ "Run Actor" ], "requestBody": { "required": true, "content": { "application/json": { "schema": { "$ref": "#/components/schemas/inputSchema" } } } }, "parameters": [ { "name": "token", "in": "query", "required": true, "schema": { "type": "string" }, "description": "Enter your Apify token here" } ], "responses": { "200": { "description": "OK" } } } } }, "components": { "schemas": { "inputSchema": { "type": "object", "required": [ "domains" ], "properties": { "domains": { "title": "Domains or URLs", "minItems": 1, "maxItems": 100, "type": "array", "description": "Company website domains or full URLs to profile (1-100). Accepts bare domains ('example.com'), hostnames ('www.example.com'), or full URLs ('https://example.com/about'); each is normalized to an https homepage fetch. One JSON tech-profile record is produced per input, charged per domain successfully profiled. Use this for B2B sales targeting, competitive technographic research, or building a technology dataset across a list of companies.", "items": { "type": "string", "minLength": 3, "maxLength": 300 } }, "deepRender": { "title": "Force JavaScript rendering", "type": "boolean", "description": "When off (default), pages are fetched as raw HTML and only escalated to a JavaScript render if the site blocks or thins the plain request — the cheapest path. Turn on to force a full JavaScript render on every domain, which catches technologies injected dynamically by client-side scripts. Leave off for most bulk runs; raw HTML already contains the loader tags for the large majority of technologies.", "default": false } } }, "runsResponseSchema": { "type": "object", "properties": { "data": { "type": "object", "properties": { "id": { "type": "string" }, "actId": { "type": "string" }, "userId": { "type": "string" }, "startedAt": { "type": "string", "format": "date-time", "example": "2025-01-08T00:00:00.000Z" }, "finishedAt": { "type": "string", "format": "date-time", "example": "2025-01-08T00:00:00.000Z" }, "status": { "type": "string", "example": "READY" }, "meta": { "type": "object", "properties": { "origin": { "type": "string", "example": "API" }, "userAgent": { "type": "string" } } }, "stats": { "type": "object", "properties": { "inputBodyLen": { "type": "integer", "example": 2000 }, "rebootCount": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "restartCount": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "resurrectCount": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "computeUnits": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 } } }, "options": { "type": "object", "properties": { "build": { "type": "string", "example": "latest" }, "timeoutSecs": { "type": "integer", "example": 300 }, "memoryMbytes": { "type": "integer", "example": 1024 }, "diskMbytes": { "type": "integer", "example": 2048 } } }, "buildId": { "type": "string" }, "defaultKeyValueStoreId": { "type": "string" }, "defaultDatasetId": { "type": "string" }, "defaultRequestQueueId": { "type": "string" }, "buildNumber": { "type": "string", "example": "1.0.0" }, "containerUrl": { "type": "string" }, "usage": { "type": "object", "properties": { "ACTOR_COMPUTE_UNITS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "DATASET_READS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "DATASET_WRITES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "KEY_VALUE_STORE_READS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "KEY_VALUE_STORE_WRITES": { "type": "integer", "example": 1 }, "KEY_VALUE_STORE_LISTS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "REQUEST_QUEUE_READS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "REQUEST_QUEUE_WRITES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "DATA_TRANSFER_INTERNAL_GBYTES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "DATA_TRANSFER_EXTERNAL_GBYTES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "PROXY_RESIDENTIAL_TRANSFER_GBYTES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "PROXY_SERPS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 } } }, "usageTotalUsd": { "type": "number", "example": 0.00005 }, "usageUsd": { "type": "object", "properties": { "ACTOR_COMPUTE_UNITS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "DATASET_READS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "DATASET_WRITES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "KEY_VALUE_STORE_READS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "KEY_VALUE_STORE_WRITES": { "type": "number", "example": 0.00005 }, "KEY_VALUE_STORE_LISTS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "REQUEST_QUEUE_READS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "REQUEST_QUEUE_WRITES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "DATA_TRANSFER_INTERNAL_GBYTES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "DATA_TRANSFER_EXTERNAL_GBYTES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "PROXY_RESIDENTIAL_TRANSFER_GBYTES": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 }, "PROXY_SERPS": { "type": "integer", "example": 0 } } } } } } } } } } ```