Actors in Store
Apify Store is home to hundreds of public Actors available to the Apify community. It's the easiest way for you to start with Apify.
Anyone is welcome to publish Actors in the store, and you can even monetize your Actors. For more information about how to monetize your Actor, best practices, SEO, and promotion tips and tricks, head over to the Getting the most of your public Actors in Apify Store section of the Apify Developers Academy.
Pricing models
All Actors in Apify Store fall into one of the four pricing models:
- Rental - to continue using the Actor after the trial period, you must rent the Actor from the developer and pay a flat monthly fee in addition to the costs associated with the platform usage that the Actor generates.
- Pay per result - you do not pay for platform usage the Actor generates and instead just pay for the results it produces.
- Pay per event - you can run the Actor and you do not pay for platform usage the Actor generates. Instead you pay for the specific events the Actor creator defines, such as for generating a single result or starting the Actor.
- Pay per usage - you can run the Actor and you pay for the platform usage the Actor generates.
Rental Actors
Rental Actors are Actors for which you have to pay a recurring fee to the developer after your trial period ends. This empowers the developer to dedicate more time and effort to their Actors, thus ensuring they are of the highest quality and receive ongoing maintenance.
Most rental Actors have a free trial period. The length of the trial is displayed on each Actor's page.
After a trial period, a flat monthly Actor rental fee is automatically subtracted from your prepaid platform usage in advance for the following month. Most of this fee goes directly to the developer and is paid on top of the platform usage generated by the Actor. You can read more about our motivation for releasing rental Actors in this blog post from Apify's CEO Jan Čurn.
Rental Actors - Frequently Asked Questions
Can I run rental Actors via API or the Apify client?
Yes, when you are renting an Actor, you can run it using either our API, JavaScript or Python clients as you would do with private or free public Actors.
Do I pay platform costs for running rental Actors?
Yes, you will pay normal platform usage costs on top of the monthly Actor rental fee. The platform costs work exactly the same way as for free public Actors or your private Actors. You should find estimates of the cost of usage in each individual rental Actor's README (see an example).
Do I need an Apify paid plan to use rental Actors?
You don't need a paid plan to start a rental Actor's free trial. Just activate the trial, and you are good to go. After that, you will need to subscribe to one of Apify's paid plans in order to keep renting the Actor and continue using it.
When will I be charged for the Actor rental?
You always prepay the Actor rental for the following month. The first payment happens when the trial expires, and then recurs monthly. When you open the Actor in the Apify Console, you will see when the next rental payment is due, and you will also receive a notification when it happens.
Example: You activate a 7-day trial of an Actor at noon of April 1, 2021. If you don't turn off auto-renewal, you will be charged at noon on April 8, 2021, then May 8, 2021.
How am I charged for Actor rental?
The rental fee for an Actor is automatically subtracted from your prepaid platform usage, similarly to, e.g. compute units. If you don't have enough usage prepaid, you will need to cover any overage in the next invoice.
Will I be automatically charged at the end of the free trial?
If you have an Apify paid plan, the monthly rental fee will be automatically subtracted from your plan's prepaid usage at the end of your free trial, and you will be able to run the Actor for another month. If you are not subscribed to any of Apify's paid plans, you will need to subscribe to one in order to continue using the Actor after the trial has ended.
Can I cancel my Actor rental?
You can cancel the Actor rental during your trial or any time after that so you don't get charged when your current Actor rental period expires. You can always turn it back on later if you want.
Where can I see how much I have paid for Actor rental?
Since Actor rental fees are paid from prepaid platform usage, these fees conceptually belong under platform usage.
You can find the breakdown of how much you have been charged for rental Actors in the Actors tab, which you will find within the Current period tab in the Billing section.
Pay per result
When you run an Actor that is paid per result, you pay for the successful results that an Actor returns when you run it, and you are not charged for the underlying platform usage.
This makes it transparent and easy to estimate upfront costs. If you have any feedback or would like to ask something, please join our Discord community and let us know!
Pay per result Actors - Frequently Asked Questions
How do I know an Actor is paid per result?
When you try the Actor on the platform, you will see that the Actor is paid per result next to the Actor name.
Do I need to pay a monthly rental fee to run the Actor?
No, the Actor is free to run. You only pay for the results.
What happens when I interact with the dataset after the run finishes?
Under the pay per result model, all platform costs generated during the run of an Actor are not charged towards your account; you pay for the results instead. After the run finishes, any interactions with the default dataset storing the results, such as reading the results or writing additional data, will incur the standard platform usage costs. But do not worry, in the vast majority of cases, you only want to read the result from the dataset and that costs near to nothing.
Do I pay for the storage of results on the Apify platform?
You will still be charged for the timed storage of the data in the same fashion as with any other Actor. You can always decide to delete the dataset to reduce your costs after you export the data from the platform. By default, any unnamed dataset will be automatically removed after your data retention period, so usually, this is nothing to worry about.
Can I set a cap on how many results an Actor should return?
You can set a limit on how many items an Actor should return and the amount you will be charged in Options on the Actor detail page in the section below the Actor input.
Can I publish an Actor that is paid per result?
Yes, you can publish an Actor that is paid per result.
Where do I see how much I was charged for the pay per result Actors?
You can see the overview of how much you have been charged for Actors paid by result on your invoices and in the Usage tab of the Billing section in Console. It will be shown there as a separate service.
On the top of that, you can see how much you have been charged for a specific run in the detail of that run and also in the overview table showing all runs.
If you wish to see how much you have been charged for a particular Actor, you will find this information at the bottom of the Usage tab.
Pay per event
Pay per event Actor pricing model is very similar to the pay per result model. You still do not pay the underlying platform usage. Instead of results, you pay for specific events defined by the creator of the Actor. These events will vary between Actors, and will always be described, together with their pricing, on each Actor. Example events might be producing a single result, doing a unit piece of work (e.g. uploading a file) or starting an Actor.
Pay per event Actors - Frequently Asked Questions
How do I know Actor is paid per events?
You will the that the Actor is paid per events next to the Actor name.
Do I need to pay a monthly rental fee to run the Actor?
No, you only pay for the events.
What happens when I interact with the dataset after the run finishes?
You would still pay for all interactions after the Actor run finishes, same as for pay per result Actors.
Do I pay for the storage of results on the Apify platform?
You would still pay for the long term storage of results, same as for pay per result Actors.
Where do I see how much I was charged for the pay per result Actors?
Similarly to pay per result Actors, you can see how much you have been charged on your invoices, and on the Usage tab of the Billing section in the Console.
You can also see the cost of each run on the run detail itself.
Can I put a cap on a cost of a single Actor run?
Yes, when starting an Actor run, you can define the maximum limit on the cost of that run. When the Actor reaches the defined limit, it should terminate gracefully. Even if it didn't, for any reason, and kept producing results, we make always sure you are never charged more that your defined limit.
How do I raise a dispute if the charges for an Actor seem off?
Please, in such a case, do not hesitate to contact the Actor author or our support team. If you suspect a bug in the Actor, you can also always create an issue on the Actor detail in the Apify Console.
Pay per usage
When you use a pay per usage Actor, you are only charged for the platform usage that the runs of this Actor generate. Platform usage includes components such as compute units, operations on storages, and usage of residential proxies or SERPs.
With this model, it's very easy to see how many platform resources each Actor run consumed, but it is quite difficult to estimate their usage beforehand. The best way to find the costs of free Actors upfront is to try out the Actor on a limited scope (for example, on a small number of pages) and evaluate the consumption. You can easily do that using our free plan.
For more information on platform usage cost see the usage and resources page.
Reporting issues with Actors
Each Actor has an Issues tab in Apify Console. There, you can open an issue (ticket) and chat with the Actor's author, platform admins, and other users of this Actor. Please feel free to use the tab to ask any questions, request new features, or give feedback. Alternatively, you can always write to community@apify.com.
