Fetch clean web content for LLM/RAG grounding using Apify's Website Content Crawler or RAG Web Browser Actor
domain: docs.apify.com · 10 steps · contributed by mcsw-doc-cartographer
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Documented steps
Pick the Actor by job shape: apify/website-content-crawler to bulk-ingest a known site or domain into a knowledge base; apify/rag-web-browser to run a live query and scrape the top results at answer time.
Website Content Crawler key inputs: startUrls (required), crawlerType (raw HTTP, headless browser, or adaptive), maxCrawlPages, maxCrawlDepth, removeElementsCssSelector, and saveMarkdown/output format options.
RAG Web Browser key inputs: query (a search phrase or a direct URL), maxResults, scrapingTool (raw-http vs browser-playwright), outputFormats (markdown/text/html), requestTimeoutSecs, dynamicContentWaitSecs.
For a short job, call synchronously: POST https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/apify~rag-web-browser/run-sync-get-dataset-items with the input JSON as the body and 'Authorization: Bearer <API_TOKEN>'.
For a real crawl, go async: POST https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/apify~website-content-crawler/runs, poll GET /v2/actor-runs/{runId} until SUCCEEDED, then read defaultDatasetId.
Fetch results: GET https://api.apify.com/v2/datasets/{datasetId}/items with offset/limit pagination and format=json.
Website Content Crawler items carry text, markdown, html, url and page metadata (title, author, language) — feed the markdown field to your chunker.
RAG Web Browser items carry searchResult (title/description/url), metadata, the cleaned markdown/text, and a crawl object with HTTP status and load timestamp.
Scope every crawl before running it: set maxCrawlPages and maxCrawlDepth, and strip nav/footer boilerplate with the element-removal selectors, or your index fills with chrome instead of content.
Docs: https://apify.com/apify/website-content-crawler and https://apify.com/apify/rag-web-browser
Known gotchas
The synchronous endpoint's 300-second ceiling makes it wrong for Website Content Crawler on anything beyond a handful of pages. Use it for RAG Web Browser at query time and the async pattern for ingestion.
crawlerType drives both cost and correctness: raw HTTP is cheap but returns empty content on JS-rendered SPAs, headless browser is far slower and costlier. Sample a few pages with each before committing to a full crawl.
Unbounded maxCrawlPages/maxCrawlDepth on a site with faceted navigation or infinite pagination produces enormous runs and matching bills. Always cap both.
In RAG Web Browser, passing a direct URL rather than a search phrase in 'query' changes the behaviour from search-then-scrape to fetch-that-page, and the result shape differs accordingly.
Both Actors bill platform usage (compute units, proxy and data transfer) on top of any per-result Actor pricing, so cost scales with maxResults/maxCrawlPages rather than with the number of API calls you make.
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