Niche Schools & Colleges Scraper

Niche Schools & Colleges Scraper

Scrape Niche school and college rankings, up to a million entries per run. Every school comes with its grade, reviews, acceptance rate, SAT range, and computed stats. No login or API key. Export to CSV, JSON, Excel, or XML.

Niche does not offer a public API for its ranking data, and manual collection across dozens of lists is slow and error-prone. This Actor reads the public ranking pages directly, filtered by list type and result count, and returns each school in one fixed schema. It works for K-12 schools, school districts, and colleges.

Who uses it	What they scrape Niche for
Market researchers	Track which colleges or K-12 schools are rising in national rankings.
Education consultants	Build a shortlist of best-fit schools for a client based on Niche grades.
Real estate professionals	Pull the top-rated school districts in a region to support home-buying decisions.
Data analysts	Feed a dataset of school stats into a model that predicts enrollment trends.

What it does

This Actor collects schools from any Niche ranking list and returns each one as a flat row with its grade, reviews, and key stats.

• 📋 13 ranking lists: Best Colleges, Top Public Universities, Best Value Colleges, Best K-12 Schools, Best School Districts, Most Diverse Schools, Best Teachers, Best College Prep, Largest Schools, Best for STEM, Best for Arts, Best Sports, and Niche Standout Schools.
• 🔢 Configurable depth: Set a maximum number of schools to scrape, from a 10-row preview up to 1,000,000 entries on paid plans.
• 🌐 Residential proxies built in: Niche blocks datacenter IPs after the first request. The Actor defaults to US residential proxies so your runs complete.

Results export to CSV, JSON, Excel, or XML, or straight from the API.

What you can do with Niche data

📈 Track ranking shifts over time.

A market researcher runs the Best Colleges list monthly, compares the grade and rank columns, and flags schools that moved more than five spots for a client report.

🏡 Match home buyers to top school districts.

A real estate agent scrapes the Best School Districts list for a metro area, filters by grade, and attaches the data to property listings.

🎓 Build a college shortlist by value.

An independent counselor pulls the Best Value Colleges list, filters by acceptance rate and net price from the dataset, and delivers a ranked spreadsheet to a student.

📊 Feed a school-quality model.

A data scientist scrapes the Most Diverse Schools and Best Teachers lists, joins them on school ID, and trains a model that predicts community satisfaction scores.

Why choose this scraper

	What you get
One fixed schema	Every school, whether K-12 or college, lands in the same flat structure so you can merge lists without cleaning.
No login, no API key	The Actor reads the public ranking pages. You do not register an app or manage OAuth tokens.
Respects rate limits	Built-in delays and residential proxies keep your runs stable without triggering Niche's anti-bot defenses.

How it compares

This Actor is the only Apify scraper built specifically for Niche ranking lists. The competitor below scrapes a different source and is included because buyers sometimes weigh it for education data.

Feature	ParseForge	RateMyProfessors Data Scraper for Schools & Professors
Scrapes Niche.com rankings	Yes, 13 ranking lists for K-12 and colleges	Not listed
Returns Niche grades and review counts	Yes	Not listed
Built-in residential proxy support	Yes, defaults to US residential	Not listed
K-12 school and district lists	Yes	Not listed
College acceptance rate and SAT range	Yes	Not listed

Configure the run

Drive the Actor from a single ranking list and a maximum item count, and filtering runs as each school is read so only matches reach your dataset. The Input tab lists every parameter.

A first run with the defaults:

{
  "listType": "best-colleges",
  "maxItems": 10,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true,
    "apifyProxyGroups": [
      "RESIDENTIAL"
    ],
    "apifyProxyCountry": "US"
  }
}

A larger pull:

{
  "listType": "best-colleges",
  "maxItems": 200,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true,
    "apifyProxyGroups": [
      "RESIDENTIAL"
    ],
    "apifyProxyCountry": "US"
  }
}

Pricing

Pay-per-result: $0.0055 per result collected. You pay only for the results written to your dataset.

Results collected	Approximate cost
100 results	$0.55
1,000 results	$5.50
10,000 results	$55.00

New Apify accounts start with $5 in free credit.

Free users

Free-plan runs return up to 10 results as a preview. Upgrade your Apify plan to collect up to 1,000,000 results per run.

Run it

1. Create a free Apify account with $5 in credit.
2. Open the Niche Schools & Colleges Scraper.
3. Set your inputs and any filters, then click Start.
4. Export the results as CSV, Excel, JSON, or XML from the Dataset tab.

Run it programmatically through the Apify API (run-sync-get-dataset-items) or the ApifyClient for JavaScript and Python.

Use with AI agents (MCP)

Give an AI agent live access to Niche through the Model Context Protocol. Add the Actor to Claude, Cursor, or any MCP client:

claude mcp add --transport http apify "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=parseforge/niche-schools-scraper"

Then prompt it in plain language to run the scraper and read back the results.

Troubleshooting

Why am I getting no results?

Check that you selected a valid listType and that maxItems is set to at least 1. If the list has fewer schools than your maxItems, the Actor returns whatever is available and finishes normally.

The run fails with a timeout or block message.

Confirm that residential US proxies are enabled in the proxy configuration. Niche blocks datacenter IPs after the first request, so the default residential setting is required for runs longer than a single page.

I only got 10 schools but I set maxItems higher.

Free Apify accounts are limited to 10 items per run. Upgrade to a paid plan to raise the limit up to 1,000,000 schools.

The dataset has fewer columns than I expected.

Not every field is available for every school type. For example, SAT ranges appear on college profiles but not on elementary school profiles. The Actor returns null for fields that Niche does not provide for that entry.

The run is taking a long time.

Large maxItems values mean more pages to paginate through. Residential proxies add a small overhead per request. Lower maxItems if you need faster turnaround, or let the run complete for a full list.

FAQ

Question	Answer
Can I scrape multiple ranking lists in one run?	Each run targets one list type. To collect several lists, run the Actor once per list and merge the datasets afterward. The flat schema makes that straightforward.
Does this Actor get every school on a list or only the first page?	It paginates through the full ranking until it hits your maxItems limit or the end of the list. You control the depth with the maximum schools setting.
What is the difference between the K-12 lists and the college lists?	The K-12 lists return public, private, and charter schools plus districts where applicable. The college lists return four-year institutions. Both land in the same output schema.
Do I need my own proxies?	No. The Actor defaults to Apify's US residential proxies, which are required because Niche blocks datacenter IPs. You can override the proxy setting if you have a preferred pool.
Is there a free tier?	Free Apify users can scrape up to 10 schools per run as a preview. Paid users can set maxItems up to 1,000,000.
What data fields does the Actor return?	The output includes the school name, Niche grade, review count, acceptance rate, SAT/ACT ranges, net price, and location, among other fields. The exact field list is shown in a sample on the Actor's page.
Can I filter by state or school type inside the Actor?	The Actor scrapes the full national ranking for the list you choose. To isolate a state or school type, apply a filter in your spreadsheet or database after the run completes.
How often can I run this Actor?	You can schedule it as often as you need. The built-in delays and residential proxies are designed to keep runs stable even at higher frequencies.
Does this Actor handle Niche's anti-bot page?	Yes. It uses residential US proxies by default and includes request delays that together avoid the anti-bot challenge page that blocks datacenter IPs.
Can I export the data to Google Sheets?	You can export the dataset to CSV, JSON, Excel, or XML from the Apify platform, then import that file into Google Sheets.

Related actors

Browse the full ParseForge collection for more scrapers.

🆘 Need help? Email parseforge@protonmail.com with your run ID, your input, and what you expected.

⚠️ Disclaimer. This Actor is unofficial and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Niche.com, Inc. It collects only publicly available data. You are responsible for using the collected data in compliance with the source's terms of service and applicable data-protection laws, including GDPR, CCPA, and PIPL. Do not use it to collect personal data unlawfully.