Socrata Open Data — Any Government Portal (CDC, HHS, NY, NYC & 100s more)

Search and pull data from any Socrata open-data portal — the platform behind hundreds of US federal, state and city government data sites: data.cdc.gov, datahub.hhs.gov, data.cms.gov, data.ny.gov, data.cityofnewyork.us, data.texas.gov and many more. Two modes in one actor: discover datasets across every portal by keyword, then pull the rows you want with SoQL filters. Clean structured JSON, no API key, no anti-bot.

Keywords: Socrata API, SODA API, open data, government data, data.gov alternative, CDC data, NYC open data, public data API, SoQL.

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Why this actor

Socrata powers a huge share of US government open data, and it exposes two excellent public APIs — a cross-portal Discovery API and the per-dataset SODA query API with SoQL filtering. This actor wraps both so you can go from "I need X data" to clean rows in one run:

• Discovery mode — search by keyword across every Socrata portal and get back each matching dataset's domain, ID, name and description.
• Data mode — point at a domain + dataset ID and pull the rows, with full SoQL support: $where filters, $select field projection, $order sorting.
• Hundreds of portals — federal (CDC, HHS, CMS), state (NY, Texas, Washington), and city (NYC, LA, Seattle, Chicago).
• No API key required — keyless by default; add a free Socrata app token for higher rate limits.
• No anti-bot — these are the governments' own official data APIs.

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Two ways to use it

1. Find a dataset (discovery): leave domain/datasetId blank and pass a searchQuery.

{ "searchQuery": "restaurant inspections", "maxResults": 25 }

→ returns datasets like data.cityofnewyork.us / 43nn-pn8j — DOHMH NYC Restaurant Inspection Results.

2. Pull the data: pass the domain + datasetId (from discovery or the dataset URL), plus optional SoQL.

{
  "domain": "data.cdc.gov",
  "datasetId": "9bhg-hcku",
  "select": "state,sex,age_group,covid_19_deaths",
  "where": "state='United States'",
  "order": "covid_19_deaths DESC",
  "maxResults": 5000
}

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Input

Field	Type	Description
searchQuery	string	Keyword to find datasets across all portals (discovery mode).
domain	string	Portal domain, e.g. data.cdc.gov (data mode).
datasetId	string	Dataset 4x4 ID, e.g. 9bhg-hcku (data mode).
where	string	SoQL $where filter.
select	string	SoQL $select (comma-separated fields).
order	string	SoQL $order sort.
appToken	string	Optional free Socrata app token (higher rate limits).
maxResults	integer	Max records (rows or datasets) to return.

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Output

Data mode returns each row as the dataset defines it, plus _domain, _dataset_id, _scraped_at. Discovery mode returns one record per matching dataset:

{
  "_type": "dataset",
  "domain": "data.cityofnewyork.us",
  "dataset_id": "43nn-pn8j",
  "name": "DOHMH New York City Restaurant Inspection Results",
  "description": "...",
  "rows_count": 280000,
  "permalink": "https://data.cityofnewyork.us/d/43nn-pn8j",
  "scraped_at": "2026-06-11T13:00:00.000Z"
}

A final {"_type": "summary"} record reports the mode and record count.

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Pricing

Your first 25 records are free — every Apify account, no card, no trial clock. After that it is a flat $0.001 per record.

• First 25 records free per account (lifetime), then $0.001/record ($1 per 1,000)
• Zero charge on empty runs
• No monthly minimum, no rental

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FAQ

Do I need an API key? No. Socrata's APIs are keyless. A free app token only raises rate limits for very large pulls.

Which portals work? Any Socrata-powered portal — hundreds of US federal, state and city government sites.

How do I find a dataset ID? Use discovery mode (search by keyword), or copy the 4x4 ID from the dataset's URL.

Can I filter server-side? Yes — full SoQL: $where, $select, $order. Filtering happens on Socrata's side, so you only pull (and pay for) the rows you want.

Use in Claude, ChatGPT & any MCP agent

This actor is also a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server tool — call it directly from Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, Windsurf, or any MCP-compatible AI agent. The agent only pays for results delivered (same pay-per-result model).

• Per-actor MCP endpoint: https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=themineworks/socrata-open-data
• Full Mine Works MCP server (all tools): https://the-mine-works-mcp.hatchable.site/api/mcp

// Call this actor as a tool via apify-client (Node)
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';
const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN' });
const run = await client.actor('themineworks/socrata-open-data').call({ /* input from the table above */ });
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);