# Alibaba.com B2B Search: Prices, MOQ & Suppliers (`themineworks/alibaba-b2b-search`) Actor

Scrape Alibaba.com wholesale search by keyword: price range, MOQ, supplier name, country, ratings and trust signals. Currency pinned to USD. No login, no API key.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/themineworks/alibaba-b2b-search.md
- **Developed by:** [The Mine Works](https://apify.com/themineworks) (community)
- **Categories:** E-commerce, Lead generation
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

Pay per event

This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events.

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

## Alibaba.com B2B Search: Prices, MOQ & Suppliers

> **The Mine Works:** 544 users across 100 public Actors, >99% run success. Pay only for results delivered. [Browse all Actors](https://apify.com/themineworks).

Scrape Alibaba.com wholesale search results by keyword: price range, minimum order quantity, supplier name and country, ratings and trust badges. No login, no API key, no browser.

**This is Alibaba.com, the B2B wholesale marketplace where you buy from a factory or trading company at a minimum order quantity, not AliExpress, the retail site where you buy single units.** If you need AliExpress instead, see [AliExpress Product Scraper](https://apify.com/themineworks/aliexpress-products).

✅ Real MOQ and price ranges, not single-unit prices · ✅ Supplier name, country and years on the platform · ✅ Currency pinned to USD, no IP-driven drift · ✅ Certifications and trust badges parsed out · ✅ Empty runs never billed · ✅ MCP-ready for AI agents

### Search Alibaba by keyword

```json
{
  "searchTerms": ["stainless steel water bottle", "led strip light"],
  "maxItems": 100
}
```

Each term is searched independently and paginated automatically until it reaches your `maxItems` or the search runs out of results. A run with two terms and `maxItems: 100` returns up to 50 from each.

### What data do you get

Real record from a live search:

```json
{
  "search_term": "stainless steel water bottle",
  "product_id": "1600960742487",
  "title": "Customized Color Logo 500Ml Reusable Gym Sport Metal Bottles Stainless Steel Vacuum Flasks Drinking Water Bottle",
  "product_url": "https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/Customized-Color-Logo-500Ml-Reusable-Gym_1600960742487.html",
  "price_low": 0.99,
  "price_high": 1.5,
  "price_currency": "$",
  "moq_quantity": 50,
  "moq_unit": "pieces",
  "supplier_name": "Chengdu Binduo Technology Co., Ltd.",
  "supplier_country": "CN",
  "supplier_years": "6 yrs",
  "review_score": 4.8,
  "review_count": 228,
  "certifications": ["Declaration of Conformity"],
  "is_sponsored": false
}
```

| Field | Description |
| --- | --- |
| 📝 `title` | Product title, HTML highlight tags already stripped |
| 🔗 `product_url` | Direct link to the product listing |
| 💵 `price_low`, `price_high`, `price_currency` | Parsed price range, always in USD |
| 📦 `moq_quantity`, `moq_unit` | Minimum order quantity, parsed to a number and unit |
| 🏭 `supplier_name`, `supplier_country`, `supplier_years` | Who you'd be buying from |
| ⭐ `review_score`, `review_count`, `supplier_service_score`, `shipping_score` | Alibaba's own trust metrics |
| 🏅 `certifications` | Compliance badges shown on the listing (e.g. Declaration of Conformity), when present |
| 📣 `is_sponsored` | True if the listing was a paid placement rather than an organic search result |

### Why the price is always in USD

Alibaba shows prices in whatever currency it guesses from the visitor's apparent location. Tested directly: the identical search returned British pounds from one connection and comma-formatted euros ("3,95 €") from another. Left unpinned, prices from the same actor would silently vary in currency and decimal format run to run, which makes price comparison useless.

This actor forces USD display on every request. Verified stable across different network exits with the fix in place, and drifting without it.

### A search that never says "no results"

Alibaba's search essentially never returns zero results, even for a garbled or nonsense query. Sometimes that means loose text matches (a product code fragment, a model number substring). On some queries it can mean Alibaba falls back to unrelated inventory with no textual overlap with your search term at all. This actor passes Alibaba's own results through rather than second-guessing its relevance ranking or claiming a match quality it can't verify.

**What this means for you:** a well-formed product search (as in the examples above) returns exactly what you'd expect. An overly narrow, unusual, or garbled search term may return unrelated products rather than an honest empty result, and there is currently no automatic relevance check to catch this for you. Check the first few titles in your dataset before scaling up an unfamiliar search term.

### What this does not do, and why

**Sponsored listings are included and flagged, not filtered out.** Alibaba's search page mixes paid placements into the same results as organic listings. This actor does not strip them out; instead every row carries `is_sponsored` (true for a paid placement, false for organic) so you can filter your own dataset to organic-only if that's what you need.

**No product detail pages.** This covers the search results page: enough to compare suppliers, prices and MOQs across a category. It does not open individual listings for full descriptions or all product images.

### Requirements

This actor needs Apify's **Unblocker proxy**. Alibaba serves an anti-bot verification page to both datacenter and residential IP ranges, measured directly across a sustained multi-request test; only Unblocker's server-side rendering reached real search results consistently. A run without Unblocker access returns nothing rather than partial data. Page loads through Unblocker can take up to a minute; this is normal.

### Common use cases

**Sourcing research.** Compare price, MOQ and supplier trust signals across a product category before reaching out.

**Competitive pricing.** See what wholesale price range a product category is actually selling at.

**Supplier discovery.** Build a shortlist of suppliers by country, years on the platform and review score.

**Lead generation for sourcing agencies.** Turn a client's product brief into a ranked list of real suppliers and starting prices.

### Run it on a schedule

1. Run the actor once with the input you want repeated, then click **Save as a task**.
2. Turn on **Monitor mode** so later runs return only new listings.
3. In the Apify Console go to **Schedules** → **Create new**, name it, set your timezone and a frequency.
4. Under **Actors or tasks to run**, add the task you saved.

Nothing is charged just for a schedule existing. Full options are in Apify's [Schedules documentation](https://docs.apify.com/platform/schedules).

### FAQ

**Is this the same as AliExpress?**
No. Alibaba.com is wholesale: minimum order quantities, supplier-to-buyer, prices for bulk. AliExpress is retail: single units, consumer-to-consumer style checkout. Different platform, different actor.

**Why does a run sometimes take longer than expected?**
Reaching Alibaba reliably requires a proxy tier that renders the page server-side, which is slower than a plain HTTP request. This is a deliberate trade for consistent results rather than a bug.

**Are prices always accurate?**
Prices are read directly from Alibaba's page at the time of the run and pinned to USD as described above. Alibaba itself may show tiered pricing by quantity beyond what fits in a simple range; the `price_low`/`price_high` fields reflect the range shown on the search page.

**Is this GDPR compliant?**
It collects only supplier and product information that Alibaba publishes publicly to promote those listings.

### Use from Claude, ChatGPT and any MCP agent

```
https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=themineworks/alibaba-b2b-search
```

Or call it programmatically:

```js
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN' });

const run = await client.actor('themineworks/alibaba-b2b-search').call({
    searchTerms: ['stainless steel water bottle'],
    maxItems: 50,
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);
```

# Actor input Schema

## `searchTerms` (type: `array`):

Keywords to search on Alibaba.com, one search per term. Each returns wholesale listings with price, MOQ and supplier details.

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

Maximum products to return across all search terms. Default 100, maximum 1000.

## `monitorMode` (type: `boolean`):

Run on a schedule and get ONLY products not delivered in a previous run, so a standing supplier watch bills for new listings instead of the same search results every time. Keep the input the same across runs.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "searchTerms": [
    "stainless steel water bottle"
  ],
  "maxItems": 20,
  "monitorMode": false
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `results` (type: `string`):

No description

# 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 = {
    "searchTerms": [
        "stainless steel water bottle"
    ],
    "maxItems": 20
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("themineworks/alibaba-b2b-search").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 = {
    "searchTerms": ["stainless steel water bottle"],
    "maxItems": 20,
}

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("themineworks/alibaba-b2b-search").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 '{
  "searchTerms": [
    "stainless steel water bottle"
  ],
  "maxItems": 20
}' |
apify call themineworks/alibaba-b2b-search --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,themineworks/alibaba-b2b-search"
        }
    }
}

```

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/gwWfMOgNyBzg3KiqR/builds/ny11WyqdFmebSmSt4/openapi.json