Facebook Profile and Page Scrapers: What You Can Actually Read

November 8, 2026

A Facebook Page is a public business or creator presence. A personal profile belongs to a person. The rules for reading them are very different, and most "Facebook profile scraper" searches are really about Pages. This post shows what each one exposes, what the official API allows, and how to track Page growth over time.

Pages: what the Graph API gives you

The Page node in the Graph API has fields like category, fan_count and verification_status. For a published Page you don't manage, Meta says these can be read with Page Public Content Access or Page Public Metadata Access Page reference. Both are features your app has to request. Page Public Content Access needs App Review and business verification PPCA docs.

Rate limits also apply. For Page tokens, Meta's formula is 4800 * Number of Engaged Users calls per 24 hours; for app tokens it is 200 * Number of Users per hour rate limiting docs. A small app with few users has a small budget.

Personal profiles: mostly off limits, and for good reason

The Graph API is built around consent. Meta's comments documentation, for example, says other users' profile information "will not be returned" unless those users authorize your app comments reference. Many profiles are also visible only to friends. Treat a personal profile as public only for what anyone logged out can see, and think twice before storing it. Under privacy laws like the GDPR, a person's public data is still personal data.

What a Page usually shows publicly

Method: track follower growth across many Pages

Follower counts are only interesting over time. Take one snapshot a day, store it, and compute growth.

1. Keep a list of Page URLs in a text file.
2. Once a day, read each Page and append date, url, followers to a CSV.
3. Compute weekly growth: (followers_today - followers_7_days_ago) / followers_7_days_ago * 100.
4. Flag any Page whose weekly growth is more than three times its usual rate. That is often a viral post, a giveaway or a paid push.

import csv, datetime, os, requests

KEY = os.environ["SCRAPEIO_API_KEY"]
today = datetime.date.today().isoformat()

with open("pages.txt") as f, open("followers.csv", "a", newline="") as out:
    w = csv.writer(out)
    for url in (line.strip() for line in f if line.strip()):
        r = requests.get("https://scrapeio.com/v1/facebook/profile",
                         params={"url": url}, headers={"x-api-key": KEY}, timeout=60)
        body = r.json()
        if body.get("success"):
            d = body["data"]
            w.writerow([today, url, d.get("name"), d.get("category"), d.get("followers")])

Run it from cron or a scheduled job. Fifty Pages a day is 50 calls, or about 1,500 a month.

Common mistakes

• Mixing likes and followers. Older Pages show both a like count and a follower count, and they differ. Pick one and use it everywhere. Followers is the better measure of who sees posts.
• Comparing rounded numbers. Facebook often shows "1.2M". If your source gives rounded counts, daily growth on a large Page will look like zero for weeks and then jump. Use exact counts or compare over longer periods.
• Tracking the wrong Page. Big brands run country Pages and fan Pages. Confirm the URL and the category before you start a time series.
• Ignoring missing days. If a run fails, leave a gap rather than copying yesterday's number. Fake flat days hide real changes.

Picking a tool

• You manage the Page: use Meta's own insights or the Graph API with a Page token. You get reach and impressions, which no outside tool can see.
• You study other Pages and have a registered business: apply for Page Public Metadata Access. It is free if you get approved.
• You need results this week, for many Pages: a hosted API saves the review process.

How to do it with ScrapeIO

The Facebook profile API takes a Page URL, a profile.php?id= URL, a numeric id or a Page name and returns name, followers, category and avatar for 1 credit. Add Facebook profile photos API and Facebook profile posts API for content. Private or not-found answers are not charged.

Sources

Checked on 8 November 2026 from each vendor's own pages. Prices and limits change; follow the links before you decide.

• https://developers.facebook.com/docs/graph-api/reference/page/
• https://developers.facebook.com/docs/features-reference/page-public-content-access
• https://developers.facebook.com/docs/graph-api/overview/rate-limiting/
• https://developers.facebook.com/docs/graph-api/reference/object/comments/