Goodreads Scraper

Scrape Goodreads books, reviews, authors, series, shelves and Listopia lists: ratings, rating distribution, review text, genres, ISBN, editions and author profiles. Search by title, ISBN or URL.

Goodreads Scraper reads the same public data API that the Goodreads website itself uses, so every field on a book page is available as clean JSON: average rating with the full 1-5 star distribution, ratings and review counts per language, genres, ISBN-10/13 and ASIN, pages, format, publisher, publication and first-publication dates, series and position, awards, characters, places, edition count, and how many people are currently reading or want to read the book. Reviews come with the star rating, full text, date, likes, comments, the reviewer's public display name and the shelves they put the book on, and can be sorted newest/oldest or filtered by language and star rating. Author profiles, Listopia lists, shelves/genres, series pages and search results are covered too. No Goodreads account is needed. Download JSON, CSV or Excel, or use the API from Python, Node, n8n, Make or Google Sheets. You pay only for the items you get.

What data does Goodreads Scraper extract?

Every item has a type field: book, review, author, list_entry or search_result.

Book items (type: "book", mode books)

Field	Description
id, url, workId, workUrl	Goodreads book (edition) ID and URL, plus the work ID shared by all editions
title, titleComplete, originalTitle	Title as shown, full title with series suffix, and the work's original title
authors, authorName	[{name, url, id, role, isGoodreadsAuthor}]; role is Author, Illustrator, Translator, Editor, ...
isbn, isbn13, asin	Identifiers of this edition (isbn fields are null for Kindle-only editions)
description, descriptionHtml	Plain-text and HTML description
genres	Top community genres, e.g. ["Fantasy", "Classics", "Fiction"]
averageRating, ratingsCount, reviewsCount	Work-level rating stats (all editions)
ratingDistribution	{"5": n, "4": n, "3": n, "2": n, "1": n} counts
reviewsByLanguage	Text-review counts per ISO language code, e.g. {"en": 79593, "es": 3691}
pages, format, publisher, publishedAt, firstPublishedAt, language	Edition details; dates are YYYY-MM-DD
series, allSeries	{name, position, url, id} of the primary series and all series the book belongs to
coverImageUrl	Full-size cover
awards	[{name, category, designation, year, url}] including Goodreads Choice Awards (designation is WINNER or NOMINEE)
characters, places	Names from the work's "Characters" and "Setting" sections
editionsCount, editionsUrl, quotesCount	Number of editions and quotes for the work
currentlyReadingCount, wantToReadCount	Social counters shown on the book page
kindleUrl, kindlePriceUsd	Amazon Kindle link and price when Goodreads shows one
kcaId, workKcaId	Goodreads' internal GraphQL IDs (useful for the API)
scrapedAt	ISO 8601 timestamp

Review items (type: "review", mode reviews)

Field	Description
bookId, bookTitle	Book the review belongs to
reviewId, url	Goodreads review ID and public review URL (/review/show/<id>)
rating	Integer 1-5, or null for a text-only review without stars
text, textHtml	Review body as plain text and as HTML
createdAt, updatedAt	ISO 8601 UTC timestamps
likes, commentsCount	Like and comment counts
reviewer	{displayName, url, id, isAuthor, reviewsCount, followersCount} as shown publicly next to the review
shelf, shelves	Exclusive shelf (read, currently-reading, to-read) and the reviewer's custom shelves/tags
isSpoiler	Whether the reviewer flagged the review as containing spoilers

Author items (type: "author", mode author)

id, name, url, imageUrl, bio, born, bornPlace, died, website, genres, influences, memberSince, isGoodreadsAuthor, averageRating, ratingsCount, reviewsCount, followers, booksCount (distinct works), topBooks ([{bookId, title, url, averageRating, ratingsCount, publishedYear, editionsCount, coverImageUrl}], up to 10).

List, shelf and series rows (type: "list_entry", mode list)

listId, listTitle, listUrl, listKind (list, shelf or series), rank, bookId, title, authorName, authorUrl, score and votes (Listopia), shelvedCount (shelves), seriesPosition and seriesLabel (series), averageRating, ratingsCount, reviewsCount, publishedYear, editionsCount, url, coverImageUrl.

Search results (type: "search_result", mode search)

searchTerm, rank, bookId, title, authorName, authorUrl, authorId, averageRating, ratingsCount, publishedYear, editionsCount, url, coverImageUrl.

How to use Goodreads Scraper

1. Pick a Mode: books, reviews, author, list or search.
2. Paste Start URLs (book, author, Listopia list, shelf/genre, series or search pages) and/or Search terms (titles or ISBNs), one per line. In books and reviews mode a list, shelf, series, author or search URL expands to the books on it (up to Max books per list).
3. Set Max items (and Max reviews per book in reviews mode) to cap the run and the cost.
4. Optionally choose the Review order (popular, newest, oldest), a Review language (en, es, ...) or a Review star rating.
5. Click Start. Results appear in the Dataset tab; export from there or use the API.

Input example

{
  "mode": "reviews",
  "startUrls": [{ "url": "https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5907.The_Hobbit" }],
  "searchTerms": ["9780593135204", "Dune Frank Herbert"],
  "maxItems": 1000,
  "maxReviewsPerBook": 300,
  "reviewSort": "newest",
  "reviewLanguage": "en"
}

{ "mode": "books", "startUrls": [{ "url": "https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1.Best_Books_Ever" }], "maxBooksPerListing": 100, "maxItems": 100 }

{ "mode": "list", "startUrls": [{ "url": "https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/science-fiction" }], "maxItems": 500 }

Output example

{
  "type": "book",
  "id": 54493401,
  "url": "https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54493401-project-hail-mary",
  "title": "Project Hail Mary",
  "authors": [{ "name": "Andy Weir", "url": "https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6540057.Andy_Weir", "id": 6540057, "role": "Author", "isGoodreadsAuthor": true }],
  "isbn": "0593135202",
  "isbn13": "9780593135204",
  "asin": "0593135202",
  "genres": ["Science Fiction", "Fiction", "Audiobook", "Space", "Adventure"],
  "averageRating": 4.51,
  "ratingsCount": 1859357,
  "reviewsCount": 182903,
  "ratingDistribution": { "5": 1165287, "4": 522731, "3": 135481, "2": 27349, "1": 8509 },
  "pages": 476,
  "format": "Hardcover",
  "publisher": "Ballantine Books",
  "publishedAt": "2021-05-04",
  "firstPublishedAt": "2021-05-04",
  "language": "English",
  "series": null,
  "awards": [{ "name": "Hugo Award", "category": "Best Novel", "designation": "NOMINEE", "year": "2022", "url": "https://www.goodreads.com/award/show/9-hugo-award" }],
  "editionsCount": 134,
  "currentlyReadingCount": 154810,
  "wantToReadCount": 1349020,
  "coverImageUrl": "https://m.media-amazon.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1764703833i/54493401.jpg",
  "scrapedAt": "2026-09-09T16:40:12Z"
}

{
  "type": "review",
  "bookId": 5907,
  "bookTitle": "The Hobbit, or There and Back Again",
  "reviewId": "36953286",
  "url": "https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/36953286",
  "rating": 5,
  "text": "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.\n\nBooks exist in time and place ...",
  "createdAt": "2008-11-05T15:18:37Z",
  "likes": 872,
  "commentsCount": 150,
  "reviewer": { "displayName": "Will Byrnes", "url": "https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/1526851-will-byrnes", "id": 1526851, "isAuthor": false, "reviewsCount": 1373, "followersCount": 121499 },
  "shelf": "read",
  "shelves": ["all-time-favorites-fiction", "young-adult", "fiction"],
  "isSpoiler": false
}

How to scrape Goodreads reviews for a book

Set Mode to reviews, paste the book URL (or its ISBN/title as a search term) and set Max reviews per book. Reviews are fetched 100 per request through Goodreads' own data API, so thousands of reviews per book are reachable; use Review order newest to follow a book over time, or filter by Review language and Review star rating (for example only 1-star English reviews).

Can I look up books by ISBN?

Yes. Put ISBN-10 or ISBN-13 numbers into Search terms (dashes are fine). Each ISBN resolves to its Goodreads edition; in books mode you get the full book item, in reviews mode its reviews. Titles work the same way; add the author name to a title to disambiguate (Dune Frank Herbert).

How to get all books from a Goodreads list, shelf or genre

Use list mode with a Listopia URL (/list/show/...), a shelf or genre URL (/shelf/show/fantasy, /genres/fantasy) or a series URL to get the ranked rows with score, votes, rating and book URL. Listopia lists are paginated in full (100 rows per page); shelf and genre pages show their top 50 books to visitors who are not signed in, so a shelf yields 50 rows. Use books mode with the same URL to get the full book item for every book on it (Max books per list controls how many are expanded).

Does it work without a Goodreads account?

Yes. The actor only reads pages and API responses that Goodreads serves to anonymous visitors. Private profiles, private shelves and anything that requires signing in are never accessed.

Is scraping Goodreads legal?

This Actor collects only publicly available data: book metadata, aggregate ratings, public reviews with the display name Goodreads shows next to them, public author profiles and public lists. It does not collect emails, phone numbers or any data from private profiles or shelves. You are responsible for how you use the data and for complying with Goodreads' terms and applicable law (including GDPR/CCPA if you process reviewer names).

Pricing

Pay per item: book $0.003, author $0.003, review $0.001, list/shelf/series/search row $0.001. There is no subscription and no start fee; Apify's free plan is enough to try it.

Integrations and API

Use the run in Zapier, Make, n8n, Google Sheets, or call it from Python/Node with the Apify client. See the API tab for ready-made snippets.

Support

Found a bug or need a field added? Open an issue in the Issues tab; it is usually answered within a day.