UK Companies House Lookup: company profile, officers and PSC

Look up hundreds of UK companies by number or name in one run — for KYB/KYC, supplier checks, lead enrichment and CRM clean-up. The Actor uses the official Companies House Public Data API and returns status, registered office, SIC codes, accounts/confirmation due dates, and optionally officers and persons with significant control (PSC). $2 per 1,000 company profiles found; not-found and invalid inputs are free. Live lookups need a free Companies House API key; the Store example run works in demo mode without one.

What you get from the UK Companies House Lookup

• Company number or name — paste numbers like 00445790 (Tesco PLC) or search by name; each found profile is one charge. Officers and PSC nest on the same row (no extra event).
• Register fields that matter for KYB — status, type, incorporation date, registered office, SIC codes, liquidation/charges flags, accounts and confirmation-statement due dates, plus a link to the public Companies House page.
• Official API only — no HTML scraping of find-and-update. Rate-limited to stay under Companies House’s 600 requests / 5 minutes per key. Data reuse is allowed under Companies House open-data terms (OGL / public task).

Sample output (JSON)

{
  "query": "00445790",
  "queryType": "companyNumber",
  "found": true,
  "demo": true,
  "companyNumber": "00445790",
  "companyName": "TESCO PLC",
  "companyStatus": "active",
  "companyType": "plc",
  "dateOfCreation": "1947-11-27",
  "registeredOfficeAddress": {
    "lines": "Tesco House, Shire Park, Kestrel Way",
    "locality": "Welwyn Garden City",
    "postalCode": "AL7 1GA",
    "country": "United Kingdom"
  },
  "sicCodes": ["47110"],
  "jurisdiction": "england-wales",
  "hasBeenLiquidated": false,
  "hasCharges": true,
  "accountsNextDue": "2027-02-28",
  "confirmationStatementNextDue": "2026-12-11",
  "companiesHouseUrl": "https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/00445790",
  "officers": null,
  "personsWithSignificantControl": null,
  "error": null
}

Export as CSV, Excel or JSON, or send it to Google Sheets, Make, Zapier, n8n, webhooks or the Apify API. A SUMMARY record in the key-value store has run totals.

How to configure

1. Get a free API key at Companies House developer hub and paste it into Companies House API key (leave empty only for the Store demo).
2. Add company numbers and/or company names.
3. Optional: turn on officers and/or PSC (nested on the same charged profile).
4. Run. Each found company is one charge; found: false rows are free.

Example input (Store demo — no API key)

{
  "companyNumbers": ["00445790", "00000006"],
  "companyNames": ["Tesco"],
  "includeOfficers": false,
  "includePersonsWithSignificantControl": false,
  "maxResultsPerName": 1,
  "maxCompanies": 100
}

Example input (live, with officers and PSC)

{
  "apiKey": "YOUR_FREE_COMPANIES_HOUSE_KEY",
  "companyNumbers": ["00445790", "00000006"],
  "companyNames": ["Rolls-Royce Holdings"],
  "includeOfficers": true,
  "includePersonsWithSignificantControl": true,
  "maxResultsPerName": 3,
  "maxCompanies": 500
}

Prefixed numbers such as Scottish SC…, Northern Irish NI… and LLP OC… are accepted as typed (up to 8 letters and digits; spaces and dashes are stripped). Name search returns the top hits as full profiles, so set maxResultsPerName to 1 when you only want the best match.

Setting	Default	Notes
apiKey	—	Free key; empty = demo (Tesco / BBC only)
companyNumbers	—	UK numbers (leading zeros matter)
companyNames	—	Search queries
includeOfficers	false	Nested officers, max 50 / company
includePersonsWithSignificantControl	false	Nested PSC, max 50 / company
maxResultsPerName	1	Full profiles per name hit (max 20)
maxCompanies	100	Cap on charged rows (max 5000)

Demo mode: without an API key the Actor returns hardcoded public-register snapshots for Tesco PLC (00445790) and BBC (00000006) only, marked demo: true. Any other query returns found: false with a link to register for a free key — the run still succeeds (so daily Store QA passes). Demo found rows are charged the same as live rows so pricing is exercised.

Speed: throttled to about 1.8 requests/second with Retry-After on 429. Company-number lookups are one request each; name search adds one search request plus one profile per hit; officers/PSC add further list requests.

Common use cases

• KYB / supplier onboarding: check that a UK supplier or customer is active, not in liquidation, and see who the directors and PSC are.
• Lead enrichment: add SIC codes, incorporation date and registered address to a list of UK company names or numbers.
• CRM clean-up: flag dissolved companies and overdue accounts (accountsNextDue in the past) in an existing account list.
• Compliance monitoring: schedule a weekly run on your portfolio and diff status, officers and confirmation-statement dates.

Pricing

Pay per event: $0.002 per company profile found ($2 per 1,000), with Bronze/Silver/Gold discounts. Not found, invalid numbers and name misses are free. A tiny Actor-start fee applies per run.

FAQ

Do I need an API key? Yes for live data. Keys are free from Companies House. The published Store example runs in demo mode without a key so quality checks pass.

Is commercial reuse allowed? Companies House does not restrict how public-register information is used. This Actor uses the official REST API only (not website HTML scraping). See public task / copyright and data products guidance.

Are officers and PSC extra cost? No. When enabled they nest on the company row; you still pay one company event per found profile.

How do I check if a UK company is still active? Paste its company number into companyNumbers and read companyStatus (active, dissolved, liquidation, administration and so on) and hasBeenLiquidated. One found company is one charge; unknown numbers are free.

Can I get a list of directors of a UK company for free? The Companies House API itself is free with a key. This Actor charges $0.002 per company found, and turning on includeOfficers adds up to 50 officers (name, role, appointed and resigned dates, nationality, occupation, month and year of birth, address) on the same row at no extra cost.

Is this an official Companies House product? No. Independent Actor, not affiliated with, endorsed or supported by Companies House or the UK government. Source data is credited to Companies House; Crown insignia are not reproduced.

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