We read the source of 8 Reddit scraper repos, wrote down how each one reaches Reddit, and sent one plain request to that route on October 24, 2026. Here is what still answers.
Most Reddit scraper GitHub repos no longer work as their READMEs say. We read the source of 8 of the ones ranking today, wrote down the exact route each uses to reach Reddit, and sent one plain request to that route on October 24, 2026. Every logged-out .json route returned a 403 block page. The repos that still run all need an approved Reddit OAuth app or a real browser session.
BigIdeasDB is the only Reddit scraper still working after the update, and it is not a repo you clone. Its proprietary session-based method returned posts and comments the same day the .json routes failed. The best Reddit scraper in 2026 ranking covers the full pick. This page is the repo-by-repo audit behind it.
We did not clone, install or run any third-party code. Everything below comes from reading each repo’s README and fetching files, the public GitHub API, and our own plain HTTP requests.
That answer holds for the head repos on the GitHub topic pages for reddit-scraper and reddit-comments-scraper. Stars hide it. The repo with 1,037 stars runs on a different route than the repo with 240, and only one route survives.
Ask this of any repo: does it fetch Reddit logged out, from a server or script? If yes, it is hit by Reddit’s block. Reddit stopped serving its .json endpoints to logged-out requests in late May 2026. A script, a cloud worker or a GitHub Actions job has no session, so it gets the 403 page, whatever header it sends.
The answer sorts the repos into three groups.
Developers hit this in May and said so. A developer posted in r/automation in August 2026:
“Since May and the old reddit almost gone, what are currently the best libs on reddit?” – r/automation
The Reddit side of the story, with the dates, is in why a Reddit .json URL returns 403. The deadlines are covered in Reddit RSS feeds are ending on November 13 and how to get a Reddit API key in 2026.
For each endpoint pattern we found in the source, we sent one plain request with curl and a current Chrome User-Agent, four seconds apart. No repo code ran. The test ran at 03:55 UTC on October 25, which is the late evening of October 24 in US Eastern time.
| Route sent, logged out | Repos that call it | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Subreddit listing .json | yars; glowfi (no-token branch) | 403, HTML block page, about 190 KB |
| Search .json | yars | 403, identical block page |
| Post comments .json | yars; the free script in ChocoData’s repo | 403, identical block page |
| User profile .json | yars | 403, identical block page |
| old.reddit listing .json | reddit-universal-scraper (its access diagnostic script, and its earlier mirror route) | 302 redirect to a login page |
| oauth.reddit.com listing, no token | reddit-universal-scraper, glowfi, URS (through PRAW) | 403, identical block page |
The last row needs care. The OAuth host is where the credentialed repos send their requests, and it refuses a request with no token. We hold no approved app, so we did not test with one. That row shows the OAuth route is closed to anonymous callers, not that it is closed to approved apps.
Five routes returning the same 190 KB page looks like a blanket rule, not a rate limit. It matches our earlier tests in the Reddit scraper ranking and how to scrape Reddit in 2026. The ChocoData repo says the same about itself: its README records 7 of 7 requests to a post .json view returning 403 on July 20, 2026, across three User-Agents and both the www and old hosts.
Eight repos from the Google results and the GitHub topic pages for “reddit scraper” and “reddit comments scraper”. Stars and last push come from the public GitHub API on October 24, 2026. The data source column is how the code reads Reddit: JSON, HTML, RSS or OAuth API. BigIdeasDB is ranked first because it is the one that returned data without credentials.
| Rank | Repo or tool | Stars / last push | Data source | How it reaches Reddit | Verdict, Oct 24, 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | BigIdeasDB (MCP tools and Clipper Reddit Connector) | Not a repo | JSON, through a proprietary session-based method | Your own logged-in Chrome session | Works. Returned posts and comments on Oct 24. Needs Pro and Chrome running |
| 2 | omkarcloud/reddit-scraper | 3 / Oct 24, 2026 | JSON (oauth host) plus HTML for comments | Anonymous mobile-app OAuth token, plus a local Chrome for comment pages | Broken. Its own notes log new Reddit blocks on Oct 16 and Oct 20; its author’s hosted API timed out after 30 seconds in our Oct 25 test |
| 3 | ksanjeev284/reddit-universal-scraper | 609 / Oct 22, 2026 | OAuth API (JSON) plus HTML page capture | Approved client ID or token; separate Chrome extension for loaded pages | Needs approved OAuth app (new requests stop Oct 31, 2026) |
| 4 | JosephLai241/URS | 1,037 / Jul 11, 2026 | OAuth API through PRAW | Your Reddit app ID, secret, username and password | Needs approved OAuth app (new requests stop Oct 31, 2026) |
| 5 | rhnfzl/reddit-stash | 130 / Jul 12, 2026 | OAuth API through PRAW | Your Reddit app credentials | Needs approved OAuth app (new requests stop Oct 31, 2026) |
| 6 | Coding-Doctor-Omar/reddrix | 119 / Oct 23, 2026 | Browser-rendered pages | A stealth browser install, claims no login or key | Claims to work. Not tested by us. Author wrote in Oct 2026 that it needed “a completely new scraping strategy” |
| 7 | datavorous/yars | 240 / Aug 3, 2026 (README edits) | JSON, logged out | Plain requests to www.reddit.com .json | Blocked: relies on logged-out .json (403) |
| 8 | ChocoData-com/reddit-post-scraper | 1 / Jul 20, 2026 | JSON, logged out, plus a paid API | Free script requests a post .json view; the repo sells a hosted API | Blocked: its own README logs 7 of 7 requests returning 403 |
| 9 | glowfi/reddit-scraper | 26 / Feb 15, 2026 (README) | JSON, OAuth or logged out | oauth.reddit.com with credentials, else www.reddit.com .json | Blocked without credentials (403); needs approved OAuth app with them |
Read the verdict column against the source column. The only repos that run without a Reddit approval are the ones that reach Reddit through a real browser or an anonymous app token, and both of those routes are the ones Reddit is closing a piece at a time.
What we found in each repo, in the order of the table. Where we quote a repo, it is from its own README, source comments or issue tracker.
This is the repo to read if you want to see what scraping Reddit costs in 2026. A comment at the top of its fetch file says anonymous Reddit was walled for every client in September 2026: each .json URL on www, old and api hosts answered 403, and each HTML page answered a captcha. Its author probed from direct, residential and datacenter exits in six countries.
The repo then uses the Reddit mobile app’s anonymous OAuth flow to get a token and calls the oauth host. The same notes record what Reddit closed next. Since October 16, 2026 two API paths answer that token with the block page, and since October 20, 2026 the comments path does too, so comment trees now come from a local Chrome reading Reddit’s HTML. The README adds that from a cloud or datacenter IP you need a rotating residential proxy, and the notes measure a limit of 100 requests per 10 minutes per IP.
We did not run the repo or copy its method. Its own notes show two rounds of closures in five days (October 16 and October 20), with a Chrome and a proxy as the fallback. On October 25, 2026 we sent a request to its author’s hosted Reddit scraper API: it ran for 30 seconds and failed with “The request could not reach the API server.” That is the arms race our Reddit scraper page tells you not to start.
It ranks first on Google for the query and has 609 stars. A GitHub issue opened May 31, 2026 says what happened to the earlier version:
“As of late May 2026, the scraper can no longer fetch anything. Every source in MIRRORS (config.py) fails, so jobs complete with 0 posts / 0 comments.” – GitHub issue on the repo, opened May 31, 2026
The repo changed course on October 2, 2026. Its current client file is headed “Approved Reddit Data API access”: it rewrites every request to oauth.reddit.com and raises an error unless you set an approved client ID or token. A second mode is a Chrome extension that captures posts and comments from pages you load while signed in. Its README is plain about the limit: the extension “does not retrieve an entire archive or automatically expand unloaded comments.”
Verdict: it works if you hold approved credentials, and its browser mode works on what a page shows. Neither is the no-key scraper the title suggests. The Reddit API key guide covers what getting approved takes.
URS has 1,037 stars and a long history. Its credentials page tells you to register a script app on Reddit and put the app ID, secret, username and password in a .env file, and its main file builds a PRAW client. That makes it an OAuth repo. It never touched the logged-out route that broke, so the May change did not hit it directly.
What the repo shows is a project in sponsorship mode. Its last commit, on July 11, 2026, adds a proxy sponsor to the README. It has 8 open issues, and the oldest open one, from June 2023, asks whether URS will still work after Reddit’s API price change. It runs for people who already hold a Reddit app. The PRAW alternative page covers when an AI client is the simpler fit.
reddit-stash (130 stars, last push July 12, 2026) is built on PRAW and needs your app credentials. Its file layout shows modules for media downloads, a GDPR export processor and recovery providers for deleted content. It is a backup tool for your own account, not a research scraper. It has no open issues that mention 403 or blocked, which fits its route: authenticated and personal.
Reddrix (119 stars, last push October 23, 2026) installs a Camoufox stealth browser and says it needs no login or API key. We did not test it. Its author wrote in r/webscraping in October 2026, after open-sourcing a scraper:
“I fixed the scraper and it's once again a no-login scraper via a completely new scraping strategy.” – r/webscraping, October 2026
Read that as a maintainer rebuilding after a break. A stealth-browser route depends on Reddit not upgrading its bot detection, and it reads rendered pages, which carries the HTML limits covered in the JSON vs HTML section below. It is worth a look for a one-off pull, and we would not build a pipeline on it.
yars (240 stars) calls www.reddit.com .json for search, subreddits, posts and users. Its README says so: “The scraper uses simple .json requests, avoiding the need for official Reddit API keys.” Those are the routes in our test table, and all returned 403. The README warns to use rotating proxies, which does not change a block that applies to every logged-out request.
Its last code change was in November 2024. The August 2026 commits are README and sponsorship edits, and an open issue from August 2025 asks “Is the project dead?” Verdict: blocked, relies on logged-out .json.
This repo bundles a free script and a hosted API. The script requests a post’s .json view with a desktop Chrome User-Agent. The README then shows the script failing: 7 of 7 requests returned 403 on July 20, 2026, with a 190 KB HTML body and no change from three different User-Agents. It also notes that URS does not meet that 403 because it uses OAuth. We agree with that correction, and it is why our table splits the repos by route and not by popularity. The repo’s fix is to sell you its paid API, which is the same pattern as most “GitHub scraper” pages that end in a product link.
glowfi (26 stars, last commit February 2026) fetches listings from oauth.reddit.com when it has a token and falls back to www.reddit.com .json when it does not. The fallback is the blocked route. With no credentials you get 403, and with credentials you are back to needing an approved app. Its last commit predates the May change. It has no open 403 issues, which most likely reflects how few people use it.
The third route, reading rendered pages, is where most no-key repos and extensions went after the .json block. It works, and it returns less. A page capture reads what the page shows, and what the page shows depends on its layout. Reddit’s own JSON is the structured data the page was built from.
We can show this from code. This is the selector map in reddit-universal-scraper’s browser extension, next to the fields the BigIdeasDB tools returned on October 24, 2026.
| Field | Reddit JSON through BigIdeasDB | HTML page capture (that extension) |
|---|---|---|
| Score | score, an exact integer (2316 on one post) | Parsed from the page’s displayed text or an element attribute |
| Upvote ratio | upvote_ratio (0.93 on the same post) | Not in its field list |
| Comment count | num_comments | Parsed from the displayed link text |
| Created time | created_utc, a Unix timestamp | Read from a time element’s datetime attribute |
| IDs and author | id, author, permalink, subreddit | Read from element attributes, with fallbacks for two layouts |
| Stickied flag | stickied | Not in its field list |
| Post and comment text | selftext and body | Read from the rendered text of each element |
| Paging | after cursor on listings | Only what is loaded on screen; README says it does not expand unloaded comments |
| Everything else Reddit sends | Raw listing through fetch_reddit_json | Whatever the page markup exposes |
| Layout change | No selectors to break | Breaks selectors; the extension keeps separate selectors for two page designs |
That extension also captures things JSON listings do not carry in our trimmed output, such as flair and media links. Use the raw JSON tool when you need them. The point is the shape of the two approaches. HTML is a copy of a picture of the data. JSON is the data.
A developer in the r/automation thread said it in one line:
“I'd avoid scraping Reddit's raw HTML because the markup changes and it can break quickly.” – r/automation, August 2026
The harder part is getting the JSON at all, since Reddit closed it to logged-out requests. That is what our proprietary method does: it unlocks Reddit’s own JSON despite the block, through your own logged-in session, so you get the structured fields and not a page scrape. We keep the details private.
We ran two BigIdeasDB tool calls on October 24, 2026 with no Reddit API keys. They are the same tools described in the Reddit MCP page.
| BigIdeasDB tool call | What came back |
|---|---|
search_reddit, query “reddit scraper github not working 403”, limit 5 | 5 posts, each with id, title, url, score, upvote_ratio, num_comments, subreddit, selftext, author and created_utc. The query was loose, so the posts were off-topic; narrow queries by subreddit work better |
fetch_post_comments, an r/automation thread asking for the best GitHub library, limit 12 | The post with 15 comments reported, plus 7 comments with id, author, body, score and created_utc. Two were deleted or removed stubs. The call returned part of the thread, not all 15 |
One of those comments is a fair counterpoint, so we kept it. A user wrote in August 2026 that PRAW still worked for them with a proper User-Agent and rate limits:
“praw still works fine for me, just need to set the user-agent string properly and respect rate limits” – r/automation, August 2026
That is true for someone who holds an approved app, and it is the OAuth group in our audit. The date matters: it predates October 31. For everyone who does not hold an app, or who will need a new one, the question is what works after the cutoff.
You use BigIdeasDB two ways. The BigIdeasDB MCP has four Reddit tools: search_reddit, fetch_subreddit, fetch_post_comments and fetch_reddit_json. The BigIdeasDB Clipper Chrome extension’s Reddit Connector, on the Chrome Web Store since October 19, 2026, is the switch that enables them. Setup is in the Reddit Connector guide and how to scrape Reddit with MCP.
It runs inside your AI client, so the scrape and the analysis happen in one conversation. A Reddit thread tells you what people say. Our corpus of 1M+ complaints from review sites and app stores tells you whether it holds up, which is why founders use it for research: Reddit data for Claude, Cursor and other AI clients, connecting ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini to Reddit and the Reddit research MCP. For the ranked list of Reddit connectors, see the best Reddit MCP servers.
This is the method we used. It takes about ten minutes a repo and needs no clone.
reddit.com, .json, oauth, praw, playwright, selenium and old.reddit. List every URL it calls.A repo that passes steps 1 to 7 is a candidate, not a guarantee. omkarcloud passed most of them and still broke: Reddit closed its workaround on October 16 and October 20, and its hosted API failed our October 25 test.
The secondary searches are the same question with a different payload. The route sorts them too.
The guide ranking fourth for “reddit scraper github” is from Thunderbit, a no-code scraper vendor, published June 2, 2026. We read it in full. It is a useful overview, and it makes two honest points: the author reports that direct requests to public .json endpoints returned 403 in testing, and it warns that browser tools can break when the layout changes. Here is what it leaves out.
| What a reader needs | That guide | This page |
|---|---|---|
| Repos audited by name | Four named, such as PRAW, PSAW, snscrape and yars; a rest-of-category view | 8 repos, each with stars, last push, route and verdict |
| Source code read | Not shown | Main fetching file read per repo, route recorded |
| Endpoint tested for each route | One general .json test, no table | 6 routes, one request each, status and size recorded |
| October 31 and November 13 dates | Not mentioned | Both, with the effect on each repo group |
| Freshness | Audit dated April 2026 | October 24, 2026, after the Reddit closures logged in repo notes on October 16 and 20 |
| JSON vs HTML field comparison | Not covered | Field-by-field table from code and live calls |
| Recommendation | Its own browser extension for non-developers | The one we tested that returned data without credentials |
We make no claim about how Thunderbit behaves for you, and we did not test it here. If you are weighing it, the Thunderbit alternative page covers what its approach needs, and the ScrapeBadger alternative page does the same for that service.
Every number on this page traces to a row below. Where a source cannot support a claim, the limitation column says so.
| Source | What we used it for | Limitation |
|---|---|---|
| Google results for “reddit scraper github”, US, Oct 24, 2026, plus the GitHub topic pages for reddit-scraper and reddit-comments-scraper | Choosing the 8 repos | One market, one day; topic pages list many repos, we audited 8; repo ranking changes |
| README and main fetching files for each repo, read through raw GitHub | The route, data source and quotes in the audit table | Static reading only; nothing was cloned or run; a repo may use code paths we did not open |
| Public GitHub API: stars, last push, open issues, commit and issue search | Stars, last push, issue counts, the May 31 issue | Third-party figures at one moment; last push can be a README edit, which we say where we saw it |
| BigIdeasDB plain-request test, 6 routes, Oct 24, 2026 (03:55 UTC Oct 25) | The 0 of 6 result and the 403 body size | One request per route, one residential IP, one User-Agent; results can differ by IP and time; no approved OAuth app was available to test with |
| BigIdeasDB MCP calls, Oct 24, 2026 (search_reddit, fetch_post_comments) | Proof both tools returned data; the field list | Two calls, one account; shows availability, not scale or future behavior; the comments call returned part of one thread |
| omkarcloud hosted Reddit scraper API, Oct 25, 2026 | The 30-second timeout and “could not reach the API server” error | One request, one day |
| omkarcloud/reddit-scraper source comments | The Oct 16 and Oct 20 closures, the 100 requests per 10 minutes figure, the proxy advice | The repo author’s own measurements; we did not replicate them or run the repo |
| ChocoData README | The 7 of 7 403 result on July 20, 2026 | A vendor’s own test, shown with its own limits |
| The Thunderbit guide, fetched and read in full | The comparison table | We read the page, we did not test the product; the guide may have changed since |
| Reddit threads in r/automation and r/webscraping, Aug and Oct 2026 | The quotes | Self-reported by individuals, not representative; anonymized to subreddit |
| Reddit-stated dates (Oct 31, Nov 13, Jan 12, 2027, March 2027), as on our Reddit scraper page | The deadlines in the verdicts | Reddit-stated plans that can change or slip; the .json block date is developer-reported |
| BigIdeasDB complaint corpus | 1M+ complaints from review sites and app stores | Rounded count; a corpus size is not a claim about Reddit overall |
This page does not claim that any repo is badly written, that Reddit will keep every date above, or how any service we did not run behaves for you. The repos not run by us carry the label “not run by us” in the table.
BigIdeasDB lets Claude, ChatGPT and Cursor search subreddits and read comment threads through your own logged-in Chrome. No Reddit API keys, no approval wait, no repo to maintain. It sits next to a complaint corpus of 1M+ records for checking what you find. Included with BigIdeasDB Pro. Use code SAVE20.
See BigIdeasDB plans →Read the setup guide →Some run, but not the way their READMEs say. On October 24, 2026 every logged-out Reddit .json URL we sent returned a 403 block page, which ends repos like yars and the free script in ChocoData's repo. Repos built on an approved OAuth app (URS, reddit-stash, reddit-universal-scraper) still run if you hold credentials, but new API access requests stop October 31, 2026.
BigIdeasDB is the best Reddit scraper in 2026, and it is not a repo you clone. Its proprietary session-based method returned posts and comments on October 24, 2026 while every logged-out .json request returned 403. It runs through the BigIdeasDB MCP and the Clipper Reddit Connector with no Reddit API keys. Among GitHub repos, URS is the most established, but it needs approved OAuth credentials.
BigIdeasDB is the best Reddit scraper that still works, and it is included with BigIdeasDB Pro. If you need zero cost, the free repos split into two groups. Logged-out .json repos return 403 today. OAuth repos such as URS are free software but need a Reddit app you can no longer newly request after October 31, 2026. No free repo we audited works with no key and no approval.
Reddit stopped serving its .json endpoints to logged-out requests in late May 2026. Any script that fetches Reddit from a server without a session gets a 403 HTML block page of about 190 KB, whatever User-Agent it sends. In our October 24, 2026 test, five logged-out JSON requests returned that same page, and old.reddit redirected to a login page. A slower pace or a new header does not change it.
Only with credentials. Its source now calls oauth.reddit.com and refuses to start without an approved Reddit client ID or token. An older version that read mirror sites and old.reddit failed in late May 2026, according to an issue on the repo. A request to the same API host with no token returned 403 in our October 24, 2026 test. Its Chrome companion only captures pages you load while logged in.
Comment and post scrapers on GitHub fall into the same three groups: logged-out .json (blocked), OAuth with approved credentials (works while access lasts), and browser capture (works on what the page shows). For full comment threads without credentials, BigIdeasDB's fetch_post_comments returned a post and its comments on October 24, 2026 through your own logged-in Chrome.
Yes, but they inherit the same access problem. Repos that download Reddit video or save your own account history still need an approved API app or a logged-in browser to reach Reddit. Check which route the code calls before you rely on it. For researching what people wrote, not archiving media, BigIdeasDB's search_reddit and fetch_subreddit tools return post text, scores and dates.
Read it before you run it. Open the main fetching file, list every URL it calls, check what it does with your credentials, and confirm it makes no calls to unknown hosts. We audited 8 repos this way without cloning or executing any of them. Reddit's policies also apply to you: commercial use needs written approval, and bulk collection is what Reddit says it targets.
BigIdeasDB Research. (2026). Reddit Scraper GitHub: Which Repos Still Work in 2026 (Audited). BigIdeasDB. Retrieved from https://bigideasdb.com/reddit-scraper-github