Who is Apify best for?

Apify is built for Software developers and data engineers building scraping pipelines, AI/ML teams sourcing training data or powering RAG systems, Growth marketers and sales teams automating lead generation, Market research analysts and competitive intelligence professionals. Common use cases include Feeding web data into LLMs, RAG pipelines, and vector databases; AI agent web browsing and real-time data retrieval via MCP; Lead generation and CRM enrichment from web sources.

Apify offers four self-serve tiers billed monthly (10% discount for annual billing): Free ($0, includes $5 in platform credits), Starter ($29/month with $29 prepaid usage), Scale ($199/month with $199 prepaid usage and priority chat support), and Business ($999/month with $999 prepaid usage and a dedicated account manager). All paid plans include pay-as-you-go overages. Compute unit (CU) pricing ranges from $0.30/CU (Free/Starter) to $0.20/CU (Business). Residential proxies are $7–$8/GB depending on plan. Enterprise plans are custom-priced with SLAs and dedicated delivery teams. Add-ons include additional Actor RAM ($2/GB), concurrent runs ($5/run), datacenter proxy IPs, priority support ($100), and personal training ($150/hour). Unused prepaid credits do not roll over.

What are the alternatives to Apify?

Common Web Data Infrastructure for AI alternatives to Apify include Firecrawl, Bright Data, Zyte, Oxylabs, ScrapingBee. See the full comparison hub at /verticals/web-data-infrastructure-for-ai/compare.

What do users praise about Apify?

Users frequently praise: Large library of ready-made Actors; Easy to get started with pre-built scrapers; Reliable cloud infrastructure and 99.95% uptime; Well-documented API and SDKs; Cost-effective vs. enterprise alternatives like Bright Data; Seamless integration with AI frameworks (LangChain, LlamaIndex, MCP); Developer monetization through Actor Store; Strong customer and technical support.

What are common complaints about Apify?

Frequently cited limitations: Steep learning curve for non-developers; Unpredictable compute unit costs at scale; Variable quality among community-built Actors; Cluttered and sometimes confusing dashboard; Limited transparency on partial-failure or silent errors in runs; Scheduling lacks dynamic date range configuration; Some sophisticated anti-bot targets remain difficult; Mobile management experience is clunky.

When was Apify founded and where?

Apify was founded in 2015, headquartered in Prague, Czech Republic by Jan Čurn, Jakub Balada.

Apify reports 100-200 employees, 25,000+ customers, ~$13M ARR.

AI visibility report

Apify ranks #3 in Web Data Infrastructure for AI AI search.

Outside the top three on 13 of the 25 prompts buyers actually ask.

Bright Data is cited on 10 of those losses.

25 prompts

6 platforms

Updated Oct 2, 2026 - refreshed weekly

Track Apify daily

14-day free trial. No card required. Setup comes pre-filled for Apify.

Track Apify across these prompts daily.

Start your 14-day trial

29percent

Presence Rate

Low presence

#3 among 12 vendors · still absent from 71.3% of tracked prompt responses

Top-3 citations across 150 prompt × platform pairs

#3of 12

Peer Ranking

#1#12

Above averagein Web Data Infrastructure for AI

Key Metrics

Presence Rate

28.7%

Share of Voice

15.4%

Avg Position

#35.9

Docs Presence

15.3%

Blog Presence

9.3%

Brand Mentions

60.0%

Platform Breakdown

Grok

72%18/25 prompts

Perplexity

Research dossierCapabilities, use cases, sources, reviews, pricing, and FAQ

Overview

Apify is a Prague-based, full-stack web scraping and automation platform founded in 2015 by Jan Čurn and Jakub Balada. The platform enables businesses and developers to extract structured data from any website at scale through serverless cloud programs called Actors. Apify Store hosts over 26,000 pre-built Actors covering social media, e-commerce, maps, and more, while also allowing developers to publish and monetize their own tools. The platform provides managed infrastructure including proxy rotation, anti-blocking, scheduling, and cloud storage. Increasingly positioned for AI and LLM use cases, Apify supports RAG pipelines, LangChain, LlamaIndex, and offers an MCP server for AI agent integration. It is SOC2 Type II, GDPR, and CCPA compliant and serves over 25,000 customers worldwide including Intercom, Groupon, Siemens, and the European Commission.

AI visibility report

Apify ranks #3 in Web Data Infrastructure for AI AI search.

Outside the top three on 13 of the 25 prompts buyers actually ask.

Bright Data is cited on 10 of those losses.

25 prompts

6 platforms

Updated Oct 2, 2026 - refreshed weekly

Track Apify daily

14-day free trial. No card required. Setup comes pre-filled for Apify.

Track Apify across these prompts daily.

Start your 14-day trial

29percent

Presence Rate

Low presence

#3 among 12 vendors · still absent from 71.3% of tracked prompt responses

Top-3 citations across 150 prompt × platform pairs

#3of 12

Peer Ranking

#1#12

Above averagein Web Data Infrastructure for AI

Key Metrics

Presence Rate

28.7%

Share of Voice

15.4%

Avg Position

#35.9

Docs Presence

15.3%

Blog Presence

9.3%

Brand Mentions

60.0%

Platform Breakdown

Grok

72%18/25 prompts

Perplexity

Research dossierCapabilities, use cases, sources, reviews, pricing, and FAQ

Overview

Reviews

4.8/5Capterra·437+

Praised

Large library of ready-made Actors
Easy to get started with pre-built scrapers
Reliable cloud infrastructure and 99.95% uptime
Well-documented API and SDKs
Cost-effective vs. enterprise alternatives like Bright Data
Seamless integration with AI frameworks (LangChain, LlamaIndex, MCP)
Developer monetization through Actor Store
Strong customer and technical support

Criticized

Steep learning curve for non-developers
Unpredictable compute unit costs at scale
Variable quality among community-built Actors
Cluttered and sometimes confusing dashboard
Limited transparency on partial-failure or silent errors in runs
Scheduling lacks dynamic date range configuration
Some sophisticated anti-bot targets remain difficult
Mobile management experience is clunky

Apify receives highly positive user sentiment, particularly praised for its large ready-made Actor library, ease of getting started, reliable infrastructure, and well-documented API. Enterprise and mid-market users highlight it as a cost-effective alternative to Bright Data. Common criticisms include an initial learning curve for understanding compute unit pricing, variability in community Actor quality, a cluttered dashboard, and occasional difficulty with sophisticated anti-bot targets. Reviewers across Capterra and G2 frequently cite time savings of 40–70% on manual data tasks and seamless integration with AI and automation workflows.

Prompt	Perplexity	Gemini Search	Google AI Mode	Bing Copilot	ChatGPT	Grok
Capability4/5 cited (80%)
I need to extract and chunk web content automatically for an LLM agent — which web data services offer built-in chunking or semantic splitting?	A competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	Neither your brand nor a competitor was cited	Neither your brand nor a competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	Your brand and a competitor were cited

#	Brand	PresencePres.	Share of VoiceSoV	DocsDocs	BlogBlog	MentionsMent.	Avg PosPos
1	Firecrawl	45.3%	26.5%	10.0%	20.7%	67.3%	#22.9
2	Bright Data	37.3%	19.8%	10.0%	23.3%	61.3%	#22.6
3	Apify	28.7%	15.4%	15.3%	9.3%	60.0%	#35.9
4	Zyte	20.0%	8.5%	8.0%	8.0%	26.7%	#35.1
5	Oxylabs	19.3%	8.1%	4.7%	10.0%	33.3%	#25.6
6	ScrapingBee	14.7%	9.2%	2.0%	10.7%	24.7%	#33.2
7	Scrapfly	10.7%	2.6%	0.7%	9.3%	7.3%	#21.9
8	Crawl4AI	10.0%	3.6%	6.7%	0.0%	28.7%	#12.3
9	Jina AI	8.0%	4.3%	0.7%	0.7%	8.0%	#39.7
10	Octoparse	4.0%	1.0%	0.0%	4.0%	2.7%	#17.6
11	Diffbot	2.0%	1.0%	0.0%	0.7%	12.0%	#35.6
12	Crawlee	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	—

Developer Experience5/5 cited (100%)
What web data extraction services do ML engineering teams prefer when they need reliable structured output without writing custom parsers?	A competitor was cited	Your brand and a competitor were cited	A competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	A competitor was cited

Integrations & Ecosystem5/5 cited (100%)
What web data extraction APIs have prebuilt connectors or plugins for common data warehouse and data lake destinations?	Your brand was cited	Neither your brand nor a competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	Your brand and a competitor were cited	Your brand and a competitor were cited

Performance & Reliability4/5 cited (80%)
Which enterprise proxy network providers can handle millions of requests per day without significant rate-limit failures or IP bans?	A competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	Neither your brand nor a competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	A competitor was cited

Apify ranks #3 in Web Data Infrastructure for AI AI search.

Key Metrics

Platform Breakdown

Overview

Apify ranks #3 in Web Data Infrastructure for AI AI search.

Key Metrics

Platform Breakdown

Overview

Prompts where competitors are visible and Apify is not.

Where Apify is winning1

Where Apify is losing5

Key Facts

Key Capabilities10

Key Use Cases8

Apify customer outcomes

Recent Trend

How AI describes Apify3

Most cited sources8

Alternatives in Web Data Infrastructure for AI6

Reviews

Pricing

Limitations

Topic Coverage

Prompt-Level Results

Vertical Ranking

Turn this into your team dashboard

Frequently asked questions

Setup & First Run4/5 cited (80%)
Which proxy network providers make it easiest to get rotating residential IPs set up without a lengthy sales process?	A competitor was cited	Neither your brand nor a competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	Neither your brand nor a competitor was cited	A competitor was cited	A competitor was cited

Apify ranks #3 in Web Data Infrastructure for AI AI search.

Key Metrics

Platform Breakdown

Overview

Apify ranks #3 in Web Data Infrastructure for AI AI search.

Key Metrics

Platform Breakdown

Overview

Prompts where competitors are visible and Apify is not.

Where Apify is winning1

Where Apify is losing5

Key Facts

Key Capabilities10

Key Use Cases8

Apify customer outcomes

Recent Trend

How AI describes Apify3

Most cited sources8

Alternatives in Web Data Infrastructure for AI6

Reviews

Pricing

Limitations

Topic Coverage

Prompt-Level Results

Vertical Ranking

Turn this into your team dashboard

Frequently asked questions

What does Apify do?

Who is Apify best for?

How is Apify priced?

What are the alternatives to Apify?

What do users praise about Apify?

What are common complaints about Apify?

When was Apify founded and where?

How big is Apify?