PubMed Article Search: Biomedical Papers, Journals & DOIs

Search PubMed (NCBI) for biomedical and life-science papers by keyword or PubMed query syntax. Returns PMID, title, authors, journal, publication date, DOI, PMC ID, article types and links. Uses the official free NCBI E-utilities API, no key required.

What does PubMed Article Search do?

Search PubMed's 37M+ biomedical papers: titles, authors, journals, dates, DOI and PMID links.

What can you use it for?

• Build literature lists for a disease, gene or drug.
• Track new publications on a topic with a scheduled run.
• Collect DOIs and journals for citation databases.
• Feed paper metadata into research assistants or dashboards.

Why use this Actor?

• Fast and cheap: lightweight HTTP-based Actor with no browser, so runs finish in seconds and cost very little.
• No API keys or accounts needed for the data source (see notes below).
• Clean, structured JSON that you can export as CSV, Excel, JSON or XML, or pull through the Apify API and integrations.
• Scheduling, webhooks and integrations: run it daily and send results to Google Sheets, Slack, Zapier, Make, n8n or your own API.

Input

Configure the run in the Input tab (all fields have sensible defaults).

Field	Type	Required	Default	Description
query	string	yes	-	Keywords or PubMed syntax, e.g. intermittent fasting or cancer[Title] AND immunotherapy.
sort	string (relevance / pub_date)	no	"relevance"	Relevance or newest first.
publishedAfterYear	integer	no	-	Only papers published in this year or later.
maxResults	integer	no	25	Maximum number of papers (1-200).

Example input

{
  "query": "intermittent fasting",
  "maxResults": 25
}

Output

Results are stored in the default dataset. Download them from the Output tab or via the API.

Example result

{
  "pmid": "38955141",
  "title": "Health Benefits of Intermittent Fasting.",
  "authors": "Reddy BL, Reddy VS, Saier MH Jr",
  "journal": "Microbial physiology",
  "journalAbbreviation": "Microb Physiol",
  "publicationDate": "2024-01-01T00:00:00.000Z",
  "year": 2024,
  "doi": "10.1159/000540068",
  "pmcId": "PMC11262566",
  "volume": "34",
  "issue": "1",
  "pages": "142-152",
  "articleTypes": "Journal Article, Review, Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural",
  "language": "eng",
  "url": "https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38955141/",
  "scrapedAt": "2026-09-25T07:25:44.586Z"
}

Output fields

Field	Type	Example
pmid	string	"38955141"
title	string	"Health Benefits of Intermittent Fasting."
authors	string	"Reddy BL, Reddy VS, Saier MH Jr"
journal	string	"Microbial physiology"
journalAbbreviation	string	"Microb Physiol"
publicationDate	string	"2024-01-01T00:00:00.000Z"
year	number	2024
doi	string	"10.1159/000540068"
pmcId	string	"PMC11262566"
volume	string	"34"
issue	string	"1"
pages	string	"142-152"
articleTypes	string	"Journal Article, Review, Research Support, N.I.H., Extra...
language	string	"eng"
url	string	"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38955141/"
scrapedAt	string	"2026-09-25T07:25:44.586Z"

How much does it cost?

The Actor is billed by Apify according to the pricing shown on the Pricing tab of this page. Runs are small and fast, and the Apify Free plan includes monthly platform credits so you can try it at no cost. You can set a maximum cost per run, and the Actor stops cleanly when that limit is reached.

Notes and limitations

• Results come from NCBI E-utilities (esearch + esummary). Abstracts are not included; open the PubMed link for the full record.
• PubMed query syntax works, e.g. covid[Title] AND vaccine[MeSH Terms].

Tips

• Start with a small test run, then scale up the input.
• Use Schedules to automate recurring runs and Webhooks or Integrations to deliver the data where you need it.
• Call the Actor from your code with the Apify API or the official JavaScript and Python clients.

FAQ

How do I limit to recent years?

Set 'Published from year'. Sorting by publication date returns the newest papers first.

Feedback

Found a bug or need an extra field? Open an issue from the Issues tab of this Actor and it will be looked at quickly.

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