Datacircle

Best Hacker News comment API in 2026

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ProLevelMax, ScrapingIsNotACrime and AnyAPI are the best Hacker News comment API providers in our benchmark. We benchmarked 4 providers and rank all 4 by score. For the three we score highest, we show each one's top scoring plan and each part of the plan's score. We rank 16 plans by price. ProLevelMax's top-up costs the least per 1,000 comments: $0.0006. ProLevelMax charges for each page of results. We count 5,000 comments on each page to get the $0.0006 price.

Every Hacker News comment API provider we score, ranked

  1. ProLevelMax, top-up: Overall score 94.1, Data score 93, $0.0006 per 1,000 comments
  2. ScrapingIsNotACrime, $5 pack: Overall score 63.5, Data score 100
  3. AnyAPI, top-up from $10: Overall score 62.8, Data score 100
  4. Scrappa, $10 pack: Overall score 62.6, Data score 100

  1. #1 ProLevelMax: Hacker News comment API

    ProLevelMax, top-up

    It returns both key fields we check: Comment and Commenter.

    Overall score
    94.1
    $ per 1,000
    $0.0006
    Price score
    100
    • $ per 1,000 stories the provider can't find: $0
    • Plans of this API we rank by price: 16
    • Plans cheaper per 1,000 comments than this plan: 0
    Data score
    93
    Cost to get started score
    93
    • How you pay: a top-up you pay first
    • Least to pay before your first result: no minimum, you top up any amount
    Bundle score
    100
    • Also pays for, from the same budget: 1,063 other calls
    Performance score
    71
    • This call's median time on 1 November 2026, minus the baseline: 1.053 s
    • AnyAPI, the fastest benchmarked provider: 0.749 s
    • We scored this provider on 13 of the 20 stories in our benchmark. We sent this provider those 13 stories on 1 November 2026.
    • This plan scored 0.9927 out of 1 on those 13 stories. We trust a score on 13 stories less than a score on all 20. So we lower this plan's Data score to 93 out of 100.

  2. #2 ScrapingIsNotACrime: Hacker News comment API

    ScrapingIsNotACrime, $5 pack

    It returns both key fields we check: Comment and Commenter.

    Overall score
    63.5
    Price score
    13
    • $ per 1,000 comments: none. The provider's pages give this plan's price, but not how many comments it pays for.
    • $ per 1,000 stories the provider can't find: $0
    Data score
    100
    Cost to get started score
    93
    • How you pay: a pack you pay first
    • Least to pay before your first result: $5
    Bundle score
    97
    • Also pays for, from the same budget: GET /instagram/profile/{username} · GET /instagram/profile/{username}/contact and 31 more
    Performance score
    61
    • This call's median time on 1 November 2026, minus the baseline: 1.238 s
    • AnyAPI, the fastest benchmarked provider: 0.749 s
    • On 1 November 2026, we sent this provider all 20 stories in our benchmark.
    • This plan scored 0.9952 out of 1 on those 20 stories. That gives this plan a Data score of 100 out of 100.

  3. #3 AnyAPI: Hacker News comment API

    AnyAPI, top-up from $10

    It returns both key fields we check: Comment and Commenter.

    Overall score
    62.8
    Price score
    0
    • $ per 1,000 comments: none. The provider's pages give this plan's price, but not how many comments it pays for.
    • $ per 1,000 stories the provider can't find: the provider's pages don't say
    Data score
    100
    Cost to get started score
    93
    • How you pay: a top-up you pay first
    • Least to pay before your first result: $10
    Bundle score
    100
    • Also pays for, from the same budget: 469 other calls
    Performance score
    100
    • This call's median time on 1 November 2026, minus the baseline: 0.749 s
    • AnyAPI, the fastest benchmarked provider: 0.749 s
    • On 1 November 2026, we sent this provider all 20 stories in our benchmark.
    • This plan scored 0.9952 out of 1 on those 20 stories. That gives this plan a Data score of 100 out of 100.

The Data score on Hacker News comment APIs

We score each provider out of 100 on how many of a story's comments the provider returns. We check whether each comment's details match what Hacker News shows. We ask each provider for the comments on Hacker News stories, by the story's ID. We read each story's comments on Hacker News without signing in, within minutes of calling the providers. We count the comments that Hacker News shows, not the deleted or dead ones. We match each of the provider's comments to the Hacker News comment with the same ID. We score each story on the number of comments the provider lists. We score four details of each comment: the author, the text, the time posted and what the comment replies to. We count the provider's comments that Hacker News also lists. We divide that count by the number of comments Hacker News shows on the story. For each detail, we start with the comments on Hacker News that show the detail. We count the comments the provider lists with the same value as Hacker News. We divide that count by the number of comments that show the detail. A comment the provider doesn't list counts as missing on every detail. We count a detail as missing when the provider's value differs from the value on Hacker News. A detail counts on a story when at least one comment on the story shows the detail. On each story, we average the provider's scores for the number of comments and for each detail that counts. We average these story scores across all stories. Each story has the same weight, so a story with many comments counts the same as one with few. A story scores 0 when the provider returns no comments for the story. We leave out a story that has no comment on Hacker News. We compare a provider that ran on fewer stories with the other providers on those same stories. A provider can't score higher by running only on easy stories. We lower the score when we test the call on fewer stories than the benchmark has.

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