10 Best Google SERP APIs to Extract Search Results Efficiently

Google, the most popular search engine used by over 90% of internet users, has made data collection from this platform a highly sought-after endeavor. However, manually collecting data from Google or creating a custom Google scraper from scratch can be daunting and time-consuming. This is where Google SERP API comes in handy. It automates and streamlines the data collection process, eliminating the challenges associated with manual web scraping.

What are Google SERP APIs

Google SERP APIs are specialized interfaces that provide access to data on Google search results. Since Google does not provide an official SERP API, there are many providers of this service that offer their own SERP APIs to automate data collection from search results. They can differ in cost and the type of data they return (JSON or HTML), data format, response time, pagination support, and more.

You can use these SERP APIs in various areas, such as for the following tasks:

1. Rank Tracking. With a Google SERP API, you can create an application that automatically checks the positions of specific keywords.

2. Develop a SERP alerts tool.  This tool can send notifications whenever there are significant shifts in rankings, new competitors, or changes in featured snippets.

3. Market research. You can automate data collection on user trends and preferences based on search queries.

4. Extracting search results for research. The API lets you quickly get a list of URLs, page titles, descriptions, and other data from Google search results.

5. Obtaining information about additional SERP elements. It can also be useful to extract data about special blocks, such as featured snippets, maps, news, images, videos, and others.

6. Tracking changes. With a Google SERP API, you can create a tool that helps you track changes in Google algorithms to adapt SEO strategies.

No matter your goals for collecting data from Google search results, a SERP API will be the best solution.

Benefits of using Google SERP APIs

Before we explore the services that offer their Google SERP APIs, let’s discuss the advantages they can provide. Firstly, using an API lets you automate gathering data from search results. APIs typically return a ready-to-use set of structured data rather than HTML page code that should be parsed.

Secondly, since data collection is performed on the API side, you don’t have to deal with blocking issues or solving CAPTCHAs. Additionally, most APIs provide a built-in proxy functionality, enabling you to localize search results.

Overall, using a Google SERP API in your project will save you development time and allow you to focus on automating the processing of results rather than obtaining them.

Top Google SERP APIs in 2024

To find the most user-friendly and functional API among those available, we compiled a list of the most popular ones and tried each. Before we delve into a more detailed review of each one, we would like to present a table of the top 10 Google SERP APIs, which considers the main parameters:

We did not specify the minimum subscription price. We will discuss this separately for each service later. Instead, we have summarized the price per 1000 requests in a table to make it easier to compare different services.

In addition, if the service did not officially provide data on the number of available trial requests, we calculated them based on the data we collected after using these Google SERP APIs.

We also developed SERP scrapers for all the services and measured their response time. This process enabled us to calculate the average query execution time for each service. The graph below illustrates these results, clearly comparing the performance across different services.

The graph presents the median response times (p50) for each service, along with the 75th (p75) and 95th (p95) percentiles. Analyzing the response times can help you better understand each service’s efficiency and reliability. Lower latency indicates a faster and more responsive service, which is essential for quick data retrieval tasks.

This information is crucial for users who need to select a SERP API that meets their performance requirements. The inclusion of percentiles helps understand the distribution of response times, showing the typical performance and how the services handle higher loads and more demanding scenarios.

We’ve been collecting this data for several days, making it reliable. Now, let’s delve into a more detailed analysis of each service.

HasData

HasData offers one of the most stable Google SERP API available. It allows you to specify various search parameters, including:

• Search country and location: Target your search to a specific country or region.

• Pagination: Control the number of search results per page.

• Device type: Simulate search from a desktop computer, mobile device, or tablet.

• Search type: Choose between regular web search, news, images, or maps.

• Advanced parameters: Set filters for publication time, sorting, and other criteria.

To explore the full range of parameters, refer to the extensive documentation or use the API Playground to customize your request and generate code in various programming languages. The API Playground is incredibly user-friendly, allowing you to adjust all request parameters directly within the interface. 

HasData’s API Playground

You can effortlessly modify settings like search country, device type, and more, and instantly see the results in real time. The intuitive design ensures that even those new to API integrations can quickly and efficiently create their desired queries.

The API response is in JSON format and includes the following fields:

{
    "requestMetadata": {
        "id": "",
        "status": "",
        "url": "",
        "html": ""  // Screenshot of Google SERP page
    },
    "searchInformation": {
        "totalResults": "",
        "timeTaken": 0
    },
    "organicResults": [
        {
            "position": 0,
            "title": "",
            "link": "",
            "displayedLink": "",
            "source": "",
            "snippet": "",
            "snippetHighlitedWords": []
        }
    ],
    "localResults": {
        "places": [
            {
                "position": 0,
                "title": "",
                "rating": 0,
                "reviews": 0,
                "reviewsOriginal": "",
                "address": "",
                "hours": "",
                "placeId": "",
                "description": ""
            }
        ],
        "moreLocationsLink": ""
    },
    "relatedSearches": [
        {
            "query": "",
            "link": ""
        }
    ],
    "pagination": {
        "next": ""
    }
}

As you can see, the API returns SERP data and a screenshot of the search results page, giving users a visual representation of how their website appears in Google Search. This makes it an invaluable tool for anyone looking to improve their website’s visibility in search results. For example, you can use it to create your SERP history tool.

Now let’s summarize and consider the pros and cons of the service:

The API is designed to be user-friendly, even for beginners, thanks to including examples and the ability to view the code for a created request directly on the website. Additionally, the service offers Google SERP API integrations with Zapier and Make.com, enabling users to build their automation directly in the cloud. 

SerpAPI

SerpAPI is another service with a fairly good and convenient API. Unfortunately, its cost is quite high, and the price for the minimum tariff plan starts at $75. There is also a Playground on the website where you can configure and test your request, after which you can copy the code in one of the popular programming languages.

The interface is intuitive, and the documentation is complete and understandable. This also makes the service quite suitable for beginners. In response, you receive a JSON with the following parameters:

{
    "search_metadata": {
        "id": "string",
        "status": "string",
        "json_endpoint": "string",
        "created_at": "string",
        "processed_at": "string",
        "google_url": "string",
        "raw_html_file": "string",
        "total_time_taken": "number"
    },
    "search_parameters": {
        "engine": "string",
        "q": "string",
        "google_domain": "string",
        "device": "string"
    },
    "search_information": {
        "query_displayed": "string",
        "total_results": "number",
        "time_taken_displayed": "number",
        "organic_results_state": "string"
    },
    "local_map": {
        "link": "string",
        "image": "string",
        "gps_coordinates": {
            "latitude": "number",
            "longitude": "number",
            "altitude": "number"
        }
    },
    "local_results": {
        "places": [
            {
                "position": "number",
                "rating": "number",
                "reviews_original": "string",
                "reviews": "number",
                "description": "string",
                "place_id": "string",
                "place_id_search": "string",
                "lsig": "string",
                "thumbnail": "string",
                "title": "string",
                "type": "string",
                "address": "string",
                "hours": "string (optional)"
            }
        ],
        "more_locations_link": "string"
    },
    "related_questions": [
        {
            "question": "string",
            "title": "string",
            "link": "string",
            "list": ["string"],
            "displayed_link": "string",
            "source_logo": "string",
            "next_page_token": "string",
            "serpapi_link": "string"
        }
    ]
}

Let’s summarize and consider its pros and cons:

Overall, SerpAPI is a powerful and versatile tool that can extract various data from Google Search. However, its high cost may make it prohibitive for some users.

Apify

Apify is a well-known service that provides various extraction APIs, including the Google SERP API. However, as tests have shown, this API is also one of the slowest.

In addition, the website only has examples of use cases for two programming languages: Node.js and Python. Moreover, the examples are based on using their library, so it can be quite difficult to build a scraper using the pure API without using additional third-party libraries.

The advantage of the service is that it provides many test requests and allows you to configure your scraper in your personal account and set its schedule. Then, it will collect data without your participation. Let’s consider a table with the pros and cons:

This one is less user-friendly than previous APIs and has several drawbacks. One significant disadvantage is the lack of examples for using the raw API without their library. 

ZenSerp

ZenSerp is a service that provides various APIs designed to collect data from different search engines. Working with this API is quite simple, and there is also a Playground on the website that allows you to configure and run API requests directly on the site. You can also view the code for the generated request, but sometimes it is generated with errors.

For example, let’s try creating a request to the Google search engine result pages API and look at the generated code:

Code errors in API Playground

The code cannot be used due to syntax errors. However, since a basic GET request is required, this is easy to fix, but it can be difficult for beginners to learn.

Let’s consider the JSON response of the corrected request:

{
    "query": {
        "apikey": "",
        "q": "",
        "url": ""
    },
    "organic": [
        {
            "position": 0,
            "localPack": [
                {
                    "place_id": "",
                    "title": "",
                    "url": null,
                    "street": "",
                    "stars": null,
                    "review": null,
                    "phone": null,
                    "description": "",
                    "price": null,
                    "type": "",
                    "extensions": null
                }
            ],
            "mapUrl": ""
        },
        {
            "position": 0,
            "title": "",
            "url": "",
            "destination": "",
            "description": "",
            "isAmp": false
        }
    ],
    "related_searches": [],
    "number_of_results": 0
}

Another drawback is that the API returns your personal API key in the response, which could lead to the leakage of your API key, which could then be used to collect data using your account. This is not very pleasant if you have paid for a high-priced plan and your personal key has been accidentally leaked.

Let’s summarize and consider the pros and cons:

Overall, ZenSerp can be a useful tool, but it’s crucial to exercise caution when handling the retrieved data to prevent exposing your personal key to unauthorized users. Additionally, basic API skills are essential for making requests and processing data without relying solely on the provided code examples. 

BrightData

Bright Data primarily positions itself as a proxy provider but also offers a Google SERP API. To work with it, you will need to register on the site and create a separate zone through which requests will be executed.

In your personal account after creating a zone for the Google Search API, you can use the Playground to try running a request to the API, after which you will receive a JSON response. However, if you try to generate code for a request to this API, you will receive code that accesses the Google page using BrightData Proxy, after which you will receive the page’s HTML code, and not the expected parsed version.

Returns cURL for scraping data using Proxy withiut parsing

 

It’s worth noting that BrightData also provides an endpoint for parsing this data, so there is a way out of this situation. Now, let’s consider the pros and cons of this service:

Overall, you might consider trying this service if you have experience with APIs and strong programming skills. 

DataForSeo

DataForSEO is another popular data gathering tool that provides a variety of tools to automate the work of SEO specialists. One such tool is the SERP API.

Unfortunately, difficulties can arise at the registration stage, as only company representatives can register on the site through the form. If you are a freelancer or just an individual, then you will need to write to technical support with a description of the situation. If everything is fine, you will receive a message with your login and password by email.

The provided SERP API is quite convenient, the only difference is that access to it is not provided through an API key, but through a key that is generated based on the login and password.

The JSON response returned by the service upon successful completion of a request adheres to the following structure:

{
    "version": "",
    "status_code": 0,
    "status_message": "",
    "time": "",
    "cost": 0,
    "tasks_count": 0,
    "tasks_error": 0,
    "tasks": [
        {
            "id": "",
            "status_code": 0,
            "status_message": "",
            "time": "",
            "cost": 0,
            "result_count": 0,
            "path": [],
            "data": {
                "api": "",
                "function": "",
                "se": "",
                "se_type": "",
                "keyword": "",
                "location_code": 0,
                "language_code": "",
                "device": "",
                "os": "",
                "depth": 0
            },
            "result": [
                {
                    "keyword": "",
                    "type": "",
                    "se_domain": "",
                    "location_code": 0,
                    "language_code": "",
                    "check_url": "",
                    "datetime": "",
                    "spell": null,
                    "item_types": [],
                    "se_results_count": 0,
                    "items_count": 0,
                    "items": [
                        {
                            "type": "",
                            "rank_group": 0,
                            "rank_absolute": 0,
                            "position": "",
                            "xpath": "",
                            "domain": "",
                            "title": "",
                            "url": "",
                            "cache_url": null,
                            "related_search_url": null,
                            "breadcrumb": "",
                            "website_name": "",
                            "is_image": false,
                            "is_video": false,
                            "is_featured_snippet": false,
                            "is_malicious": false,
                            "is_web_story": false,
                            "description": "",
                            "pre_snippet": null,
                            "extended_snippet": null,
                            "images": null,
                            "amp_version": false,
                            "rating": null,
                            "price": null,
                            "highlighted": [],
                            "links": null,
                            "faq": null,
                            "extended_people_also_search": null,
                            "about_this_result": null,
                            "related_result": null,
                            "timestamp": null,
                            "rectangle": null
                        }
                    ]
                }
            ]
        }
    ]
}

Let’s summarize and review the pros and cons of this service:

Overall, the API itself is user-friendly, but further processing of the results can be a bit tricky. 

ScrapingBee

ScrapingBee offers a comprehensive suite of data collection APIs, including the Google SERP API. The service provides the API, well-structured documentation, and articles describing API usage examples.

Since retrieving data involves making a simple GET request with parameters, including your API key, using it is quite straightforward, even for beginners.

Let’s make a request and take a look at the real-time JSON response:

{
    "meta_data": {
        "url": "",
        "number_of_results": 0,
        "zero_results_for_original_query": false,
        "location": "",
        "number_of_organic_results": 0,
        "number_of_ads": 0,
        "number_of_page": 0
    },
    "organic_results": [
        {
            "url": "",
            "displayed_url": "",
            "description": "",
            "position": 0,
            "title": "",
            "domain": "",
            "sitelinks": {
                "inline": [
                    {
                        "title": "",
                        "link": ""
                    }
                ],
                "expanded": [
                    {
                        "title": "",
                        "link": "",
                        "snippet": "",
                        "date_raw": "",
                        "date": "",
                        "answers": null,
                        "answers_raw": null
                    }
                ]
            },
            "rich_snippet": {
                "top": {
                    "detected_extensions": {},
                    "extensions": []
                }
            },
            "date": null,
            "date_utc": null

    ],
    "local_results": [
        {
            "title": "",
            "review": 0,
            "review_count": 0,
            "position": 0,
            "cid": ""
        }
    ],
    "top_ads": [],
    "bottom_ads": [],
    "related_queries": [],
    "questions": [
        {
            "text": "",
            "position": null,
            "answer": ""
        }
    ],
    "top_stories": [],
    "news_results": [],
    "knowledge_graph": {},
    "related_searches": []
}

The data is well-structured, making it easy to analyze. Let’s summarize the findings and create a table of pros and cons:

Overall, the API is relatively easy to use. However, due to its slow response time, its application in real-world projects may not be entirely convenient.

SerpWow

SerpWow offers an API to gather data from all popular search engines, including Google, Bing, Yahoo, Baidu, Naver, Yandex, and more. Overall, using this SERP API is similar to most others. Additionally, the website provides clear documentation and examples.

The biggest challenge in using this API lies in processing the retrieved data. Let’s examine the JSON response structure:

{
    "request_info": {
        "success": "",
        "credits_used": "",
        "credits_remaining": "",
        "credits_used_this_request": ""
    },
    "search_parameters": {
        "q": "",
        "engine": ""
    },
    "search_metadata": {
        "created_at": "",
        "processed_at": "",
        "total_time_taken": "",
        "engine_url": "",
        "html_url": "",
        "json_url": ""
    },
    "search_information": {
        "original_query_yields_zero_results": "",
        "total_results": ""
    },
    "local_map": {
        "image": ""
    },
    "local_results": [
        {
            "position": "",
            "title": "",
            "gps_coordinates": {
                "latitude": "",
                "longitude": ""
            },
            "link": "",
            "address": "",
            "business_type": "",
            "data_cid": "",
            "image": "",
            "extensions": [],
            "rating": "",
            "reviews": "",
            "price": "",
            "price_parsed": "",
            "price_description": "",
            "block_position": ""
        }
    ],
    "related_searches": [
        {
            "query": "",
            "link": "",
            "type": ""
        }
    ],
    "related_questions": [
        {
            "question": "",
            "answer": "",
            "source": {
                "link": "",
                "displayed_link": "",
                "title": ""

            },
            "search": {
                "link": "",
                "title": ""
            },
            "block_position": ""
        }
    ],
    "organic_results": [
        {
            "position": "",
            "title": "",
            "link": "",
            "domain": "",
            "displayed_link": "",
            "snippet": "",
            "prerender": "",
            "sitelinks": {
                "inline": []
            },
            "block_position": ""
        }
    ]
}

While we have cleaned up this JSON, in its original form it was filled with redundant data. For example, the JSON response we received consisted of 2154 lines, with most of the attributes containing a NULL value. Unfortunately, this can significantly complicate the processing of such data.

Let’s summarize and create a table of the pros and cons of this API:

Overall, using this SERP API would be quite convenient if the response format were more structured and had less redundant and unstructured data.

Oxylabs

Oxylabs is another popular service that offers various APIs, including one for collecting data from Google SERPs. You can try it out on their website in the API Playground, or you can easily integrate it into your own application.

The main disadvantage of this service is that data is retrieved not through an API key, but through a username and password. However, this username and password is not the same as the one you use to register. Instead, it is a new one that you can get when you create a user for a specific API. 

This approach might seem convenient, but it can be confusing for first-time users. The JSON response is a bit overloaded but still quite usable:

{
    "results": [
        {
            "content": {
                "url": "",
                "page": 0,
                "results": {
                    "paid": [],
                    "organic": [
                        {
                            "pos": 0,
                            "url": "",
                            "desc": "",
                            "title": "",
                            "images": [],
                            "sitelinks": {
                                "inline": [
                                    {
                                        "url": "",
                                        "title": ""
                                    }
                                ]
                            },
                            "url_shown": "",
                            "pos_overall": 0
                        }
                    ],
                    "local_pack": {
                        "items": [
                            {
                                "cid": "",
                                "pos": 0,
                                "title": "",
                                "rating": 0,
                                "address": "",
                                "subtitle": "",
                                "rating_count": 0
                            }
                        ],
                        "pos_overall": 0
                    },
                    "related_searches": {
                        "pos_overall": 0,
                        "related_searches": []
                    },
                    "related_questions": {
                        "items": [
                            {
                                "pos": 0,
                                "answer": "",
                                "source": {
                                    "url": "",
                                    "title": "",
                                    "url_shown": ""
                                },
                                "question": ""
                            }
                        ],
                        "pos_overall": 0
                    },
                    "search_information": {
                        "query": "",
                        "showing_results_for": "",
                        "total_results_count": 0
                    },
                    "total_results_count": 0
                },
                "last_visible_page": 0,
                "parse_status_code": 0
            },
            "created_at": "",
            "updated_at": "",
            "page": 0,
            "url": "",
            "job_id": "",
            "status_code": 0,
            "parser_type": ""
        }
    ],
    "job": {
        "callback_url": "",
        "client_id": 0,
        "context": [],
        "created_at": "",
        "domain": "",
        "geo_location": null,
        "id": "",
        "limit": 0,
        "locale": null,
        "pages": 0,
        "parse": true,
        "parser_type": null,
        "parsing_instructions": null,
        "browser_instructions": null,
        "url": null,
        "query": "",
        "source": "",
        "start_page": 0,
        "status": "",
        "storage_type": null,
        "storage_url": null,
        "subdomain": "",
        "content_encoding": "",
        "updated_at": "",
        "user_agent_type": "",
        "session_info": null,
        "statuses": [],
        "client_notes": null,
        "_links": [
            {
                "rel": "",
                "href": "",
                "method": ""
            }
        ]
    }
}

Unfortunately, it includes a lot of unnecessary information. Let’s consider the main advantages and disadvantages of this service:

Overall, Oxylabs provides a decent proxy service with a simple API and a large pool of proxies. However, the cluttered JSON response and unnecessary information can be a drawback.

ScraperApi

ScraperAPI is the final Google SERP API on our list. It stands out for its simplicity, providing only the essential data you need. Additionally, the service offers a scheduling feature directly on the website for automated data collection.

The advantage of this service is its user-friendly response format. It provides a concise amount of information, avoiding clutter and making it easy to process:

{
    "search_information": {
        "query_displayed": ""
    },
    "organic_results": [
        {
            "position": 0,
            "title": "",
            "snippet": "",
            "highlights": [
                ""
            ],
            "link": "",
            "displayed_link": ""
        }
    ],
    "local_packs": [
        {
            "title": "",
            "rating": 0,
            "rating_vote_count": 0,
            "details": [
                ""
            ],
            "position": 0
        }
    ],
    "related_questions": [
        {
            "question": "",
            "position": 0
        }
    ],
    "related_searches": [
        {
            "position": 0,
            "query": "",
            "link": ""
        }
    ],
    "pagination": {
        "pages_count": 0,
        "current_page": 0,
        "next_page_url": "",
        "pages": [
            {
                "page": 0,
                "url": ""
            }
        ]
    }
}

Let’s take a look at the pros and cons of this service:

In short, ScraperAPI is a solid choice for beginners new to APIs and need only basic information without additional in-depth data. Its user-friendly interface, scheduling capabilities, and lightweight data format make it a valuable tool for data collection and analysis tasks.

Conclusion

This article compared the top 10 popular services that provide Google SERP APIs. We built scrapers and gathered data that we presented in this article. Based on our analysis, the fastest Google SERP scraping APIs are HasData, SerpAPI, and BrightData.

We reviewed each service in detail, including their pricing plans. We also analyzed their JSON responses and found that ScraperAPI, HasData, SerpAPI, and ZenSerp provide the most well-structured and convenient data for further analysis.

We also evaluated the free trial options offered by each service. Based on this, we found that Oxylabs, Apify, and BrightData offer the best free trials.

If your project involves broader SEO tasks, you might find it useful to review the best APIs for SEO integrations, which offer versatile functionalities for keyword analysis, SERP monitoring, and rank tracking.

Overall, we hope this overview will help you choose the most suitable Google SERP API for your project. We have tried to analyze all available criteria and highlight the pros and cons of the most popular services.