How do I find a maintained Apify Store Actor for Google Maps or Yelp and check if it’s actively supported?

Most teams looking to scrape Google Maps or Yelp on Apify care about two things: finding an Actor that already does 90% of what they need, and knowing it won’t be abandoned the moment they wire it into a pipeline. The good news is that the Apify Store makes both discovery and maintenance status pretty visible—if you know what to look for.

Below is a practical, workflow-style guide to:

Find a maintained Apify Store Actor for Google Maps or Yelp.
Evaluate if it’s actively supported and safe to depend on.
Decide when to use a public Actor vs. build your own or ask Apify to build it for you.

Quick Answer: A maintained Apify Store Actor for Google Maps or Yelp is usually one of the top results in the Store, with recent runs, a high success rate, active issue responses, and clear documentation. You can check maintenance by looking at Actor stats (runs, success rate), issue response times, recent activity, and whether it’s a paid, popular Actor with real users.

The Quick Overview

What It Is: A Google Maps or Yelp Actor in the Apify Store is a reusable, cloud-hosted scraper that you configure, run, and integrate via API to extract business data, reviews, or locations at scale.
Who It Is For: Developers, data engineers, data scientists, and growth/ops teams who need structured map or review data (POI listings, reviews, ratings, etc.) without owning scraping infrastructure.
Core Problem Solved: It removes the maintenance tax of DIY scrapers—proxies, unblocking, scheduling, monitoring, and brittle selectors—and replaces it with a monitored Actor you can run and trust in production.

How It Works

At a high level, using a maintained Google Maps or Yelp Actor looks like this:

Discover a suitable Actor in Apify Store
- Search for “Google Maps” or “Yelp”.
- Filter/scan results to find Actors that match your use case (e.g., “Google Maps Scraper”, “Yelp Reviews Scraper”).
- Open candidates in new tabs.
Evaluate maintenance and support signals
- Check Actor stats: success rate, total users, monthly users.
- Review pricing (paid Actors often indicate ongoing support).
- Look at issues, response times, README quality, and last activity.
- Optionally run a small test run in the Apify Console.
Integrate, monitor, and iterate
- Configure input (search query, URLs, locations).
- Run manually, then via the Apify API or official SDKs.
- Schedule and monitor runs, export datasets, and connect to your existing tools (Google Sheets, Airbyte, Zapier, MCP clients, etc.).

Step-by-Step: Finding a Maintained Actor for Google Maps or Yelp

1. Start in Apify Store

Go to Apify Store.
Use the search bar and type:
- "Google Maps" for POI / places / local business scraping.
- "Yelp" or "Yelp Reviews" for reviews and ratings.

You’ll typically see:

A few high-usage Actors with clear names like “Google Maps Scraper” or “Yelp Reviews Scraper”.
Other experiment-level or niche Actors with fewer users.

From here, open the top 3–5 candidates in new tabs to compare them.

2. Evaluate Apify Store metadata (first-pass filter)

On each Actor’s page, use these signals:

a) Actor stats

Right next to the author profile, you’ll often see stats such as:

Total users: Indicates how many unique accounts have run this Actor. More users ≈ more battle-tested.
Monthly users: Indicates current activity. A non-zero, stable number suggests ongoing usage.
Runs succeeded (%): Close to 99–100% is what you want for production.

Example from a Store profile:

162 total users
12 monthly users
99% runs succeeded

That’s the sort of pattern you want to see for Actors you rely on for Google Maps or Yelp.

b) Pricing and “Try for free”

Many high-quality Actors are:

Paid per output unit (e.g., $0.30 / 1,000 reviews for Yelp Reviews Scraper).
With a free trial tier (“Try for free”.

Why this matters for maintenance:

Paid Actors are economic products: authors are incentivized to keep them unblocked, up-to-date, and supported.
Pricing per unit also suggests the author expects high-volume usage and has tuned the Actor accordingly (proxies, rate limiting, etc.).

If you see:

Pricing clearly stated.
A “Try for free” button.
Go to Apify Store and a clean README.

…that’s a strong indicator of a maintained Actor.

3. Check documentation & input/output contract

A maintained Actor has a solid README:

Clear explanation of what it does:
- For example, the Yelp Reviews Scraper says it can “Easily extract Yelp business reviews at scale” and lists fields like ratings, review text, reviewer details, timestamps, photos, and business info.
Concrete input examples:
- URLs (business or search results).
- Categories and locations.
- Limits, pagination, or filters.
Output examples and formats:
- JSON, CSV, Excel, or via API.
- Field-level description (e.g., rating, review text, author name, date, photos, business address).

On Apify, datasets are the contract. If the README:

Documents fields.
Shows example rows/objects.
References export formats (JSON, CSV, Excel, API).

…it’s a strong signal that the author cares about stability and usability, not just a proof-of-concept.

4. Look at issues & support responsiveness

This is where you really see if it’s actively supported.

On the Actor page, look for the Issues tab:

Open issues count: A few open issues is normal; lots of old, unanswered issues are a red flag.
Response time: Many authors have profile-level metrics like “1.9 days issues response”.
Resolution pattern: Are issues closed with real fixes, not just “won’t fix” or silence?

What to check:

Recent issues
- Are there issues from the last 1–2 months?
- Are they being acknowledged and resolved?
Type of issues
- “Site changed HTML / selectors broken” – gets fixed quickly? Good.
- “Captcha / blocking” – author acknowledges and tunes the Actor? Good.
- “No response for weeks/months” – risky for production.

This matters especially for Google Maps and Yelp, which change structure and anti-bot mechanisms periodically. A responsive author is essential.

5. Confirm recent activity and runs

Beyond issues and stats, look at:

Last updated date (if visible) or recent changelog notes.
Runs succeeded trend:
- If success rate is high and there are recent runs, it’s likely working with current site HTML and blocking patterns.

You can also:

Click Try for free.
Run the Actor with a small input:
- A single Google Maps search query.
- One Yelp business URL.

If the run:

Starts quickly.
Completes without errors.
Produces a non-empty dataset.

…that’s the ultimate confirmation it’s “alive” and not just a zombie listing.

How to Read “Maintenance Signals” for Google Maps vs. Yelp

For Google Maps Actors, look for:

README mentions of:
- Places, POI, business listings.
- Reviews, opening hours, coordinates, categories.
Strong success rates (98–99%+).
Evidence of handling blocking:
- Mentions of proxies, unblocking, rate limits.
Active users (monthly and total).

For Yelp Actors, like Yelp Reviews Scraper:

Clear pricing model (e.g., $0.30 / 1,000 reviews).
Fields explicitly listed: ratings, review text, reviewer details, timestamps, photos, business info.
Export formats: JSON, CSV, Excel, API.
Recent successful runs and a high success rate.

These Actors are usually built and refined because Yelp and Google Maps are popular targets; authors tend to be more active.

Features & Benefits Breakdown

Once you’ve selected a maintained Google Maps or Yelp Actor, you get more than just a script:

Core Feature	What It Does	Primary Benefit
Actor-based deployment	Packages scraping logic + configuration + dependencies into a runnable Actor in Apify’s cloud.	No servers, no cron jobs, no ad-hoc scripts; just configure input and run.
Proxies & unblocking handled by platform	Uses Apify’s infrastructure (proxies, unblocking, concurrency controls) under the hood.	Higher reliability on Google Maps/Yelp without embedding proxy logic into your code.
Datasets with exports & API access	Every run produces a dataset you can inspect, export (JSON, CSV, Excel), or consume via Apify API/SDKs.	Easy integration into pipelines, AI workflows, dashboards, or CRMs.

Ideal Use Cases

Best for Google Maps local business enrichment: Because maintained Google Maps Actors can crawl thousands of places, extract structured business details (name, address, category, rating, coordinates), and output them as clean datasets you can join to your internal records.
Best for Yelp review monitoring and sentiment analysis: Because a maintained Yelp Reviews Actor can systematically extract ratings, text reviews, timestamps, reviewer profiles, and photos—ideal for sentiment analysis, competitor monitoring, or feeding LLM-based review summarizers.

Limitations & Considerations

Terms of service & compliance: Public web data still has legal and ethical constraints. Always review Google Maps and Yelp’s terms and ensure your use complies with local laws and your company policies.
Actor scope vs. custom needs: A generic Store Actor might not cover very niche fields or complex workflows (e.g., multi-step login flows, merging Google Maps + Yelp + internal data). In that case:
- Fork and build your own Actor using Apify’s code templates and Crawlee.
- Or use Apify Professional Services to have experts build and maintain a custom solution for you.

Pricing & Plans

When using a Store Actor for Google Maps or Yelp, you typically have two layers of cost:

Apify platform usage
- Compute time, storage, and network are billed under your Apify account.
- You can start on a free or low-tier plan and scale up as workloads grow.
- Enterprise options exist with 99.95% uptime and SOC2, GDPR, and CCPA compliance.
Actor-specific pricing
- Many Store Actors have their own usage-based pricing.
- Example from the Yelp Reviews Scraper:
  - $0.30 / 1,000 reviews.
  - Includes a free tier so you can try before you standardize on it.
- Billing is consolidated through Apify, so you don’t negotiate with individual authors.

Common patterns:

Starter / Free usage: Best for evaluating Actors, proof-of-concept scrapes, and low-volume use.
Production / Enterprise usage: Best for teams needing predictable SLAs, higher limits, and enterprise compliance; combine high-usage Store Actors with Apify’s enterprise plan.

Since pricing details can vary per Actor and over time, always:

Check the Pricing tab on the Actor page.
Run a small test to estimate cost per record (e.g., per review, per place).
Starter / Evaluation: Best for engineers validating whether a Google Maps or Yelp Actor fits the schema and reliability they need.
Production / Enterprise: Best for teams running recurring scrapes, feeding BI or AI workflows, and needing stable costs and SLAs.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I quickly tell if a Google Maps or Yelp Actor is actively maintained?

Short Answer: Look for high success rates, recent activity, real users, responsive issue handling, and clear pricing with a free trial.

Details:
On the Actor page:

Runs succeeded: Aim for ~99% on a non-trivial number of runs.
Total and monthly users: Indicates real-world adoption; zero or near-zero monthly users can be a red flag.
Issues tab: Recent issues with responses in days (not months) show active maintenance.
README and pricing: A well-written README and explicit pricing (especially for high-demand sites like Google Maps and Yelp) usually signal the author expects ongoing usage and plans to support it.

You can further confirm by running a small test using “Try for free” and verifying the dataset output.

What if I can’t find a Google Maps or Yelp Actor that matches my exact requirements?

Short Answer: Use the closest maintained Actor as a reference and either build your own Actor or have Apify’s team build and maintain a custom solution.

Details:
If no existing Store Actor:

Covers your niche fields or workflow.
Has the maintenance signals you’re comfortable with.

You have three options:

Build your own Actor
- Use Apify’s code templates with Crawlee + Playwright/Puppeteer.
- Take inspiration from existing Google Maps/Yelp Actors’ input/output design.
- Deploy it to Apify, where the platform handles proxies, unblocking, cloud execution, monitoring, datasets, and exports.
Fork or adapt an existing Actor
- Use an existing maintained Actor as a starting point.
- Add custom fields, filters, or logic.
- Keep the Actor private or publish it (and optionally monetize it) in the Apify Store.
Apify Professional Services
- Engage Apify’s experts to build and maintain a private Google Maps or Yelp solution for you.
- This is ideal if you want:
  - Zero scraper maintenance in-house.
  - SLAs and enterprise compliance.
  - A team that lives and breathes proxies, unblocking, and browser automation.

Summary

To find a maintained Apify Store Actor for Google Maps or Yelp and verify it’s actively supported, you don’t need guesswork. Use a simple checklist:

Search in Apify Store for “Google Maps” or “Yelp”.
Shortlist Actors with:
- High success rate.
- Real monthly users.
- Clear pricing and “Try for free”.
Inspect the README, input/output, and pricing.
Check issue responsiveness and recent activity.
Run a small test and inspect the dataset and logs.

If you need something more specialized than what’s in the Store, treat those Actors as patterns and either build your own or ask Apify to build and maintain a custom solution. Either way, the platform handles the heavy lifting—proxies, unblocking, cloud deployment, monitoring, and data processing—so you can focus on shipping data products instead of babysitting scrapers.

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