Authentication

Every request to the Scrapely API requires an API key. You can get yours from the Dashboard.

Passing your API key

Python SDK (Recommended)
Header (cURL)
JSON Body

If you’re using Python, simply pass your API key when initializing the client. The SDK will automatically handle sending it in the headers for all subsequent requests.

from scrapely import Scrapely

# Initialize the client with your API key
client = Scrapely(api_key="YOUR_API_KEY")

Pass your API key in the X-API-Key header.

curl -X POST https://api.scrapely.io/v2/tasks/create \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -d '{ ... }'

Using the header keeps your API key out of the request body and is the recommended approach for direct API calls.

Pass your API key as api_key in the request body.

curl -X POST https://api.scrapely.io/v2/tasks/create \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "api_key": "YOUR_API_KEY",
    ...
  }'

Never expose your API key in client-side code or public repositories.

Getting Started

Core Concepts

SDKs

MCP Server

CAPTCHA

Crawler

Passing your API key

​Passing your API key

Passing your API key