Website to Markdown Crawler

Crawl a public website and save clean Markdown for an AI tool, a docs review or a content audit.

Give it one or more start URLs. It stays on those hosts, checks robots.txt before every fetch, and saves the page text with the title, the description, the language, the canonical URL, a word count and the fetch status. Duplicate pages and canonical copies are skipped.

Who it is for

People who keep a docs site, a handbook or a small public website and want the text in a form a tool can read. Also useful before an audit, when you want one file for the whole site and a short list of what was skipped.

Use it on a site you own, or on a site whose robots.txt allows this crawler. The sample start URL is the Python tutorial on docs.python.org.

What you get

• One row per saved page, with status ok or removed.
• The page as Markdown, plus the title, the description, the language, the canonical URL, the word count and the fetch status.
• Chunks split on headings. Each chunk has the heading path, the source URL and an estimated token count.
• Menus, footers, cookie notices and "Skip to main content" lines removed when the same block shows up across the site.
• A site-wide index in the llms.txt style, and one combined Markdown file, both in this run's default key-value store. OUTPUT has the download links.
• A skipped-pages report in OUTPUT: blocked by robots.txt, out of scope, duplicate, non-HTML, too large, plus failed fetches and PDFs with no text layer.
• With Changes only on, a later run returns added, changed and removed pages. Unchanged pages are not saved and are not charged.

Linked PDFs on the same site can be read when you turn PDF text on. A PDF is used only when it already has a text layer. There is no image reading. Files over 2 MB are skipped.

Tutorial

1. Add one or more Start URLs. The sample is https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/index.html. Stay with sites you own, or sites that allow this crawler.
2. Set Max depth and Max pages. Depth 0 reads the start URLs only. The sample depth is 1 and the cap is 10 pages. The hard cap is 50 pages.
3. Optionally add Include URL patterns and Exclude URL patterns. A pattern uses * as a wildcard, for example */tutorial/*.
4. Leave Chunk size at 500 and Chunk overlap at 40, or set your own. The size is an estimate, about four characters to a token.
5. Leave Changes only off for a full crawl. Turn it on, and set State store name, when you want the next run to return only what changed. Leave the name empty to use website-markdown-state.
6. Leave PDF text off unless you want text from linked PDFs on the same site.
7. Run the Actor. Open the Pages view for the rows. The OUTPUT record lists skipped URLs, how many rows were saved, how many were charged, and the download links for LLMS and MARKDOWN.

A page that fails, a duplicate, and an unchanged page are not charged.

Example input

{
  "startUrls": ["https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/index.html"],
  "maxDepth": 1,
  "maxPages": 10,
  "includePatterns": ["/3/tutorial/*"],
  "excludePatterns": [],
  "concurrency": 2,
  "chunkSize": 500,
  "chunkOverlap": 40,
  "changesOnly": false,
  "stateStoreName": "",
  "extractPdfs": false
}

Example output

{
  "status": "ok",
  "change": "full",
  "url": "https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/index.html",
  "canonicalUrl": "https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/index.html",
  "title": "The Python Tutorial",
  "description": "Python is an easy to learn, powerful programming language.",
  "language": "en",
  "wordCount": 420,
  "fetchStatus": 200,
  "kind": "html",
  "chunkCount": 2,
  "chunks": [
    {
      "text": "# The Python Tutorial\n\nPython is an easy to learn, powerful programming language.",
      "tokenCount": 20,
      "headingPath": ["The Python Tutorial"],
      "sourceUrl": "https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/index.html"
    }
  ],
  "markdown": "# The Python Tutorial\n\nPython is an easy to learn, powerful programming language.",
  "note": "",
  "retrievedAt": "2026-10-31T12:00:00.000Z"
}

The numbers above show the shape of a row. A real run fills them from the pages it fetched. change is full on a normal crawl. On a changes-only run it is added, changed or removed.

OUTPUT also holds the skipped-page counts and the download links. The links look like this:

{
  "saved": 10,
  "charged": 10,
  "llmsKey": "LLMS",
  "llmsUrl": "https://api.apify.com/v2/key-value-stores/STORE/records/LLMS",
  "markdownKey": "MARKDOWN",
  "markdownUrl": "https://api.apify.com/v2/key-value-stores/STORE/records/MARKDOWN",
  "skipped": {
    "blockedByRobots": 0,
    "outOfScope": 2,
    "duplicate": 1,
    "nonHtml": 3,
    "tooLarge": 0,
    "failed": 0,
    "noTextLayer": 0,
    "textUnread": 0,
    "blocked": 0
  }
}

Pricing

You pay a small fee when the run starts, then a fee for each page that is actually saved. The dataset itself is not charged again. Duplicate pages, unchanged pages and failed pages are free. A removed page is listed and is not charged, because no new page text was saved.

What	Price
Run start	$0.00005
Page saved	$0.002

Examples

• Ten saved pages: 10 x $0.002 = $0.020, plus the $0.00005 start fee. The total is $0.02005.
• A recrawl that saves 2 changed pages: 2 x $0.002 = $0.004, plus the $0.00005 start fee. The total is $0.00405. Unchanged pages add nothing.
• A run that saves nothing: $0.00005.

Use Max pages and the maximum cost per run to cap a single run. If this ever differs from the Pricing tab, the Pricing tab applies.

Limits

• At most 50 pages in a run, and at most 10 start URLs. The sample uses 10 pages.
• Depth is 0 to 5. The sample uses 1.
• A page is capped at 1.5 MB. A PDF is capped at 2 MB. A sitemap over 1 MB is skipped.
• Only public http and https on ports 80 and 443. Private, loopback, link-local and metadata addresses are blocked, including on a redirect. A chain stops after 3 redirects.
• Each request times out after 15 seconds. Requests to one host are at least 200 ms apart. A crawl-delay in robots.txt is honoured, up to 5 seconds.
• The crawler sends the name WebsiteToMarkdownCrawler with each request.
• Scripts are removed from the page before the Markdown is built.
• If the run is close to its time limit, it stops and keeps the pages already saved.

No personal data

This Actor does not collect personal data beyond the page content you asked it to save.

• It stores the Markdown of the pages it saves, because that text is the result.
• It does not pull emails or phone numbers out into their own fields. Email addresses in the title, the description, and the Markdown are replaced with [email removed]. Phone numbers that are part of the page are left as written.
• The run summary, the skipped-page list and the logs do not copy the page text.
• A blocked address is counted. It is not written into the summary.
• The state store, when you turn Changes only on, keeps a short record of each page so the next run can compare. It does not keep the page text.

Do not point it at a private URL or a page you are not allowed to read.

FAQ

What if robots.txt disallows a path? That URL is skipped, listed as blocked by robots.txt, and not charged. Other allowed pages are still saved. /robots.txt is read for every host you start from, and the rule is checked again for every URL, including each redirect. Include and exclude patterns do not apply to robots.txt, sitemap.xml or llms.txt.

What if robots.txt cannot be reached? A missing file, including 404 and 410, means the crawl is allowed. Other client errors are treated the same way, except 401 and 403, which skip the host. If the file cannot be reached because of a server error, a timeout, or a network error, that host is not crawled. Those pages are listed as blocked by robots.txt and are not charged.

What if the same text is published at two URLs? The second one is a duplicate and is not charged. A page whose canonical URL points at another page on the same site is treated the same way.

Why does the first changes-only run mark every page as added? The state store is empty until a run has saved a snapshot. The next run with the same store name can flag added, changed and removed pages. Leave Changes only off and no named store is opened.

What if a page did not change? On a changes-only run that page is not saved and is not charged. The snapshot is kept so the next run can compare again.

What about a PDF? Turn PDF text on. A linked PDF on the same site is saved when its text can be read and the file is under 2 MB. A file with no text layer, or text that could not be read, is skipped and is not charged. There is no image reading.

Where are the combined files? In this run's default key-value store, under LLMS and MARKDOWN. The download links are in OUTPUT.

Next additions

• More of the same kind.
• Broader coverage.
• Small follow-ups later.

Feedback

Missing a field? Open an issue on the Actor's Issues tab.