Hacker News Scraper

Hacker News Scraper

Search Hacker News using the free Algolia HN Search API. No Apify token or API key needed.

Quick Start

Only dependency: pip install requests.

# Stories about AI content marketing in last week
python3 skills/hacker-news-scraper/scripts/search_hn.py \
  --query "AI content marketing" --days 7

# Show HN posts in last month (summary view)
python3 skills/hacker-news-scraper/scripts/search_hn.py \
  --query "" --tags show_hn --days 30 --output summary

# Comments mentioning a specific tool
python3 skills/hacker-news-scraper/scripts/search_hn.py \
  --query "LangChain" --tags comment --days 14 --max-results 20

How the Script Works

• Queries the Algolia HN Search API (search_by_date endpoint)
• Uses numericFilters=created_at_i>{unix_timestamp} for server-side date filtering
• Paginates until max-results reached
• Normalizes results to a consistent schema
• Applies optional keyword filtering (client-side)
• Sorts by points (descending) and outputs JSON or summary

CLI Reference

| Flag | Default | Description |

|------|---------|-------------|

| --query | *required* | Search query |

| --days | 7 | How many days back to search |

| --tags | story | Item type: story, comment, ask_hn, show_hn |

| --max-results | 50 | Max results to return |

| --keywords | none | Additional filter keywords (comma-separated, OR logic) |

| --output | json | Output format: json or summary |

Output Format

{
  "id": "12345678",
  "title": "Show HN: My new tool",
  "url": "https://example.com",
  "author": "username",
  "points": 42,
  "num_comments": 15,
  "created_at": "2026-02-18T12:00:00.000Z",
  "hn_url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12345678",
  "text": ""
}

Cost

Free. No API key, no rate limits (within reason), no Apify credits.