1. Bright Data
  2. Proxies & Scraping Infra
  3. SERP API

FAQ - SERP API

Q: What is SERP API and how can I best use it for collecting data?

A: SERP API is one of our proxy-unlocking solutions and is designed to help you focus on your data collection from various search engines, while we take care of the full proxy, unblocking, and scraping infrastructure for you.

Check out our Getting Started guide, to see how simple it is to get SERP API up and running within your code, or explore our SERP API playground to test it for free in the Control Panel. 

Q: Which search engines does SERP API support?

A: Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Yandex, Baidu, Yahoo, and Naver Search APIs. For Google and Bing specifically, we offer additional parsing functionality as well. 

Q: On which search engines is parsing functionality supported?

A: Google & Bing. Please see our article on parsing search results with SERP API.

Q: Which Google SERP Services & Features does SERP API support? 

A: SERP API supports Google: Search, Shopping, Maps, Images, Hotels, Videos, Trends, Reviews, News, and Jobs. Check out our targeting options for these Google SERP services. 

Q: Why should I use Bright Data's SERP API?

A.  The Bright Data SERP API solution allows you to focus on what matters most, the data. It provides you with a 3-in-1 proxy unlocking solution that autonomously takes care of the proxy management (which proxy to use and when), unlocking logic (captcha solving, fingerprinting, retries, best headers, etc), and scraping functionality. 

  • Easy to integrate - In your code its as easy as swapping out the 1 line of your regular proxy network request with this 1 line SERP API request 
  • Pay only for success – You only pay for successful requests.
  • Stable and predictable Billing - CPM pricing (price per 1k requests) allows for this so the bandwidth of your request doesn't matter 
  • Accuracy – Use real user devices with laser-focused geotargeting (including city-level) to collect accurate Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs) from major search engines as a real user.
  • Built for volume and scale – Bright Data can support your growing traffic needs and peak periods with high success rates and exceptional response time (under 5 seconds), regardless of your request volume.
  • Reduce costs – Save money on data extraction engineers and IT professionals, without worrying about server maintenance.
  • Avoid operational headaches – Each request is sent from a different IP ensuring no IP is flagged or banned.
  • Structured data response – Get parsed or unparsed responses in JSON or HTML format for easy integration with any system.
  • Highly customized – Bright Data supports a wide variety of tailored parameters to answer your search requirements including different search types, different devices, results per page, etc.
  • Real Residential IPs – Access 72 million+ real user IPs in all geolocations.

Q: What are common use cases for SERP API?

A:

  • Organic Keyword Tracking - Mapping a company's ranking for various keywords in different locations
  • Brand Protection - Track top results for company brands and trademarks
  • Price Comparison - Search for products on online shopping websites and compare prices between different vendors
  • Market Research - Collect information about companies, contacts, locations, and more
  • Detect Copyright Infringements - Search for images or other copyright‐protected content
  • Ad Intelligence - See which ads are showing for keywords in different countries, including double‐click & Google ad services

 

Q: How does SERP API work?

A:

SERP_API_How_IT_works_diagram.png

  • You send a SERP API request to Bright Data's Super Proxy
  • Our Super Proxy routes the request to a suitable peer while using Bright Data's Unlocker Platform to "unlock" the site
  • A scraped response returns from the search engine back to the peer, then back to Super Proxy, and then back to you

Q: I saw that Google is making some changes to SERP results. Are you going to continue to support the SERP 'num' parameter? 

A: Yes indeed! Bright Data has developed a backup feature for the 'num' parameter which will kick in, in the event that Google stops supporting the 'num' parameter in the future. 

Our new feature will seamlessly compensate for any ‘ num ’ parameter limitations found in the initial SERP response data and send 9 additional requests (10 results each), combine them together, and return the full 100 results to you as a consolidated and comprehensive response. This new response will have the identical appearance and functionality of a response with the ‘ num=100’ parameter working flawlessly.

So, will there be any change to pricing due to this new feature?

Nope! Despite the additional requests involved in this new feature and providing the combined responses, there will be no change in pricing and this request will count for you as a single regular request for billing purposes. We understand the importance of maintaining costs and will absorb any additional costs here without passing them on to our customers.

Note: If you having issues with the ‘num’ parameter please reach out to your Bright Data account manager, and we will activate the feature for you.

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