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Contextractor Playground

Enter a URL, configure extraction settings, and preview the result. Open the homepage to start.

Extract from a URL

The playground takes a URL and crawls it server-side:

  • Enter a URL into the input field on the homepage
  • Select output formats and configure extraction settings
  • Press Crawl URL to extract content and preview the result

Every setting has an inline ? help button. Click it to read what the setting does, along with its npm library field, npm CLI flag, and Apify input key — so you can carry the same configuration across the playground, the CLI, and the Apify Actor.

Operations

The playground has one tab per operation, mirroring the CLI subcommands:

  • Extract — crawl one or more URLs and save results to storage (the default operation, run from the homepage playground; no separate page)
  • Extract one — extract a single URL with no link-following
  • Export — export stored content to a folder of files
  • Purge — clear the storage

The What to do: radio group at the bottom of the form switches each operation between the Crawl URL online preview (subtext "Preview results"; the button reads "Crawling…" while a crawl runs) and ready-to-run commands or code. The surfaces on offer depend on the operation:

  • Extract — Crawl URL preview, npm CLI, npm library (the npm lib option), Apify CLI, and Apify API
  • Extract one — Crawl URL preview, npm CLI, and npm library (no Apify surface — it is a single-page extraction, not an Actor run)
  • Export — npm CLI and npm library scripts that export local storage, plus Apify CLI and Apify API scripts that download a finished run's data from the Apify platform
  • Purge — npm CLI and npm library

Output formats

The Output checkboxes select one or more extraction formats. Each name links to a general explainer of the format itself:

  • Plain text — clean text with no markup (what plain text is)
  • JSON with metadata — structured output with metadata — title, author, date, and more (what JSON is)
  • Markdown — preserves headings, lists, links, and basic formatting (what Markdown is)
  • HTML — cleaned HTML retaining structure (what HTML is)

A separate Original raw HTML checkbox additionally returns the page HTML exactly as the crawler saw it — useful for comparing the extraction against the source. Each checkbox carries its own ? popover describing the format.

Download or copy

After extraction, you can:

  • Copy the result to your clipboard
  • Download the extracted content as a file

Run on Apify at scale

For crawling websites, scheduling runs, and processing many URLs, use the Apify Actor. The Actor accepts the same extraction settings as the playground.

Where to go next

  • Help hub — the index of every Contextractor help page.
  • Apify Actor — run extraction at scale on the Apify platform.
  • npm CLI — the command-line tool, flag reference, and JSON config.
  • npm library — embed extraction in your own Node.js application.
  • PyPI package — extract from Python with the contextractor PyPI wrapper.

Updated: July 5, 2026