Collectors · Developers & tech

Stack Overflow API in Python

Questions from Stack Overflow and sister sites — score, answers, views, tags, author. One POST from Python with the input, rows back as JSON with 22 fields, $0.0003 per delivered question. No proxies or parsers to maintain.

Get an API key See the collector

A Python requests snippet that posts { — A Python requests call to the stackoverflow collector returns one dict per question, at $0.0003 each.

First call

Install, call, read the rows.

pip install requests

The only dependency.

import os, requests

r = requests.post(
    "https://api.quanticdata.io/v1/scraper/collectors/stackoverflow/run",
    headers={"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['QD_API_KEY']}"},
    json={
        "query": "web scraping",
        "sort": "votes",
        "max_results": 30,
    },
    timeout=120,
)
r.raise_for_status()
run = r.json()["payload"]
print(run["count"], "rows,", run["cost"]["usd"], "USD")
for row in run["results"]:
    print(row.get("question_id"), row.get("title"), row.get("score"), row.get("answer_count"))

Python: one Stack Overflow questions run (Per voti), printing question_id, title, score, answer_count

The key comes from an environment variable, never from the code. The run answers in the same request when it finishes in time; payload.results holds the rows and payload.cost what they cost.

Request parameters

What the collector takes.

Input of the Stack Overflow questions collector
Parameter	Type	Required	Meaning
`query`	string	no	Keyword to search in titles/bodies.
`tags`	string	no	Semicolon-separated tag filter, e.g. python;beautifulsoup.
`site`	string: `stackoverflow`, `superuser`, `serverfault`, `askubuntu`, `mathoverflow`, `unix`, `dba`, `security`, `datascience`	no (default stackoverflow)	Stack Exchange site (default stackoverflow).
`sort`	string: `votes`, `activity`, `creation`, `relevance`	no (default votes)	Sort order (default votes).
`include_body`	boolean	no (default false)	Also deliver the question body as plain text (same call, larger rows).
`max_results`	integer	no (default 30)	How many questions to deliver at most (1–100). You pay only for delivered questions.

Response fields

22 fields per question.

Fields of each row (question)
Field	Type	What it holds
`rank`	integer	1-based position.
`question_id`	integer	Stack Exchange question id.
`title`	string	Question title (entities decoded).
`score`	integer, nullable	Net votes.
`answer_count`	integer, nullable	Number of answers.
`view_count`	integer, nullable	Views.
`is_answered`	boolean	Has at least one upvoted answer.
`has_accepted_answer`	boolean	An answer is accepted.
`tags`	string[]	Question tags.
`author`	string, nullable	Asker display name.
`author_reputation`	integer, nullable	Asker reputation.
`created_at`	string, nullable	Asked at (ISO 8601).
`last_activity`	string, nullable	Last activity (ISO 8601).
`link`	string, nullable	Question permalink.
`accepted_answer_id`	integer, nullable	Id of the accepted answer.
`author_id`	integer, nullable	Asker's user id on that site.
`author_url`	string, nullable	Asker's profile URL.
`last_edit`	string, nullable	Last edit time (ISO 8601).
`closed_at`	string, nullable	When the question was closed (ISO 8601).
`closed_reason`	string, nullable	Why it was closed (Duplicate, Needs more focus…).
`license`	string, nullable	Content license (CC BY-SA 4.0…).
`body`	string, nullable	Question body as plain text — only with include_body.

Add ?format=csv to the runs endpoint to get the same rows as CSV.

Long runs

Run in the background, then poll.

A run that needs more time can go to the background: send "async": true, get 202 with the run id, and poll the runs endpoint until the status is done. Reading a run is free.

import os, time, requests

H = {"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['QD_API_KEY']}"}
r = requests.post("https://api.quanticdata.io/v1/scraper/collectors/stackoverflow/run", headers=H,
                  json={**{"query":"web scraping","sort":"votes","max_results":30}, "async": True}, timeout=30)
run_id = r.json()["payload"]["run_id"]
while True:
    run = requests.get(f"https://api.quanticdata.io/v1/scraper/collectors/runs/{run_id}", headers=H, timeout=30).json()["payload"]
    if run["status"] in ("done", "failed"):
        break
    time.sleep(5)
print(run["status"], run["count"])

Python: background run and polling

Errors

What can come back, and what is billed.

Collector run errors
Status	Meaning	Billed
`400`	The input does not match the collector (`payload.errors`)	No
`401`	Missing or wrong API key	No
`402`	Balance and free credit do not cover the run: top up	No
`422`	The input can never resolve; retrying the same input cannot help	No
`424`	The run failed at the source (blocked, timed out, layout changed); safe to retry	No
`429`	Rate limit or a per-account brake; wait for `Retry-After`	No

Only delivered rows are billed: a run that delivers nothing costs nothing.

Price

$0.0003 per delivered question.

What Stack Overflow questions rows cost at list price
Rows	Cost
1	$0.0003
1,000	$0.30
10,000	$3.00

Up to 100 questions per run; split larger jobs into several runs. The $2 free credit every month covers about 6,666 questions. No subscription; paid tiers lower the unit price. All collector prices: collector pricing.

Before you run it

Questions developers ask

Is there a free Stack Overflow questions API?

Every account gets $2 of free usage each month, about 6,666 questions of this collector at $0.0003 each, with no card.

Do I have to handle proxies, retries or blocks?

No. The collector runs on our network and handles them; a run blocked at the source returns 424 and is not billed.

How many rows can one run return?

Up to 100 questions per run (the max_results input, where the collector has one).

Can an AI agent run it?

Yes: the MCP server exposes it as the run_collector tool, with the same input and price. See the MCP server.

Run it on the free credit.

Create an API key, export it as QD_API_KEY and run the example. $0.0003 per delivered question, no subscription.

Get an API key Stack Overflow API