Apple Podcasts Search + Charts API | Shows + Watchlist

Search Apple Podcasts via the iTunes Search API, discover top charts via Apple Marketing Tools, and refresh known show IDs via the iTunes Lookup API.

Store Quickstart

• Start with store-input.example.json for the cheapest first successful run.
• The Store default input is intentionally kept on the search-only quickstart lane so quality checks do not depend on charts/watchlist endpoints on the very first run.
• Then choose a workflow from store-input.templates.json:
  • Quickstart (Search) for keyword discovery
  • Top Charts (Top Shows) for Apple-native chart discovery
  • Watchlist Refresh for known collection IDs

What this actor does

This actor now supports three Apple-native workflows in one run:

1. Search — keyword search through the iTunes Search API.
2. Top charts — Apple podcast rankings through the Apple Marketing Tools charts feed.
3. Watchlist / lookup — metadata refresh for known collection IDs through the iTunes Lookup API.

You can run any single workflow or combine them in one input. Existing searchTerm runs stay compatible.

For first success and Store/quality-test health, keep the first run search-only. Add chartRequests or lookupIds after the baseline quickstart is green.

Key features

• 🎙️ Podcast search — search by keyword across Apple Podcasts
• 🏆 Top charts — fetch Apple top shows or top episodes by country
• 👀 Watchlist refresh — keep tabs on known show IDs without searching again
• 📻 Episode extraction — optionally fetch recent episodes from RSS feeds
• 🎨 Artwork URLs — high-resolution cover images included when available
• 🔗 Apple-native sources — iTunes Search, iTunes Lookup, and Apple Marketing Tools only

Workflow inputs

1) Search

{
  "searchTerm": "technology startups",
  "country": "us",
  "limit": 25,
  "includeEpisodes": true
}

2) Top charts

{
      "chartRequests": [
        {
          "country": "us",
          "feedType": "podcasts",
          "limit": 10
        }
      ],
      "includeEpisodes": false
}

Use feedType: "podcasts" for top shows or feedType: "podcast-episodes" for top episodes.

3) Watchlist / lookup

{
  "lookupIds": [1680633614, 1553736450],
  "country": "us",
  "includeEpisodes": false
}

Combined run

{
  "searchTerm": "artificial intelligence",
      "chartRequests": [
        {
          "country": "us",
          "feedType": "podcasts",
          "limit": 5
        }
      ],
  "lookupIds": [1680633614],
  "includeEpisodes": false
}

Output shape

The result shape stays backward-compatible. Each result still includes the same core fields (collectionId, name, artist, feedUrl, artworkUrl, genres, trackCount, releaseDate, country, itunesUrl, contentAdvisory, episodes).

Additional machine-readable fields may appear:

• discoverySource: search, chart, or lookup
• rank: chart rank for chart-discovered rows
• chartContext: the chart request that produced the result
• lookupRequested: true for watchlist lookups
• priorRank, currentRank, rankChange, status: recurring-monitoring deltas for chart/watchlist rows
• priorSeenAt, trackCountDelta: lightweight monitoring hints across recurring runs
• workflowStatus: requested/succeeded/failed workflow counts plus per-workflow status rows
• warnings: non-fatal upstream degradation warnings for mixed runs
• sourceFailures: machine-readable upstream failure rows when a requested workflow is skipped

When chartRequests or lookupIds are used, the actor also persists a prior snapshot in local/Apify-compatible state and adds meta.monitoring with:

• summary.statusCounts for new, up, down, unchanged, lookup, and exited
• topMovers for the biggest chart rank changes in the current run
• exited for rows that were present in the prior snapshot but missing now
• snapshotKey and snapshotStorage for schedule/debug visibility

If a chart/watchlist upstream call fails during a mixed run, the actor now returns partial success with meta.warnings / meta.sourceFailures and skips snapshot updates for that run so missing upstream data does not create false exited rows.

If the same show is found through multiple workflows, it can appear multiple times so source-specific metadata remains intact.

Output example

{
  "meta": {
    "generatedAt": "2026-03-01T12:00:00.000Z",
    "totals": {
      "total": 3,
      "query": "artificial intelligence",
      "chartRequests": 1,
      "lookupIds": 1
    }
  },
  "results": [
    {
      "collectionId": 1680633614,
      "name": "The AI Daily Brief: Artificial Intelligence News and Analysis",
      "artist": "Nathaniel Whittemore",
      "feedUrl": "https://anchor.fm/s/f7cac464/podcast/rss",
      "artworkUrl": "https://is1-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Podcasts211/v4/example.jpg/600x600bb.jpg",
      "genres": ["Technology", "News"],
      "trackCount": 901,
      "releaseDate": "2026-02-20T20:52:00Z",
      "country": "USA",
      "itunesUrl": "https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-ai-daily-brief/id1680633614",
      "contentAdvisory": "Clean",
      "episodes": [],
      "discoverySource": "chart",
      "rank": 1,
      "chartContext": {
        "country": "us",
        "feedType": "podcasts",
        "limit": 10,
        "requestIndex": 0
      }
    }
  ]
}

A fuller ready-to-share payload is available in sample-output.example.json.

Cost

Zero external costs. Uses only free Apple endpoints — no API keys, no proxies.

Commercial Ops

Set up .env first:

$cp -n .env.example .env

Cloud Task/Schedule setup (idempotent):

$npm run apify:cloud:setup

Daily reliability checks:

npm run canary:check
npm run contract:test:live

OpenClaw cron commands:

• openclaw-cron-commands.md

Related actors

• tech-events-intelligence — extend speaker and topic research into conferences and CFPs.
• procurement-intel-actor — monitor public-sector buyers or organizations you discover through podcast research.
• uspto-patent-scraper — add patent signals for the same companies, founders, or product themes.