Guides · Buying
How to choose a LinkedIn data API in 2026.
LinkedIn data APIs come in five kinds, and the kind matters more than the brand: how you pay (per record, per hour, per account or per month), whether you need your own LinkedIn account, and whether data is fetched when you ask or read from a stored set.
- Kinds
- 5
- Our kind
- Per record
- Profiles here
- $0.004
- Start
- $5
Updated 16 October 2026
The five kinds
| Kind | How you pay | Your LinkedIn account | Suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Per-record APIs (this one) | Per profile, company, post or job; prepaid balance | Not needed | Agents, products and scripts with variable volume |
| Scraper marketplaces | Per run or per result, set by each scraper's author; often a monthly plan | Usually not | Teams that want many sources and will compare scrapers |
| Stored datasets | Monthly credits or bulk licences | Not needed | Bulk analysis, large steady volume |
| Account-based APIs | Per connected account or seat, monthly | Yes, each user's | Messaging and inbox products |
| Automation tools | Monthly plans by execution time | Often your session | No-code workflows on your own account |
Seven questions that decide it
- What is the smallest amount I must pay to start, and does unused money expire?
- Is the price per record, and can I see the exact price before a call?
- Do I need to connect a LinkedIn account or share a cookie?
- Is the data fetched when I ask, or read from a stored set, and does each row say when?
- What happens when a profile is not found: am I charged?
- Can my agent sign itself up and stay inside a budget?
- Does the provider claim to be LinkedIn's partner? (If it is not, it should not.)
Our answers
| Question | API for Agents |
|---|---|
| Smallest amount to start | $5; agents get a $0.10 trial first. Money is kept. |
| Price per record, quoted | Yes: $0.001 to $0.004, exact quote with estimateOnly, free |
| Your LinkedIn account | Never |
| Freshness | Every row says when it was measured and whether it was fresh or cached |
| Not found | Refunded and named in coverage |
| Agent self-signup and budget | One POST to sign up; maxUsd caps each call |
| LinkedIn partner | No, and we do not claim to be |
Questions people ask.
What is the best LinkedIn data API?
The one whose kind matches your volume and workflow. For agents and variable volume, a per-record API with quotes; for huge steady volume, a dataset or high-volume plan; for acting on your own account, an account-based API.
What should a LinkedIn profile cost by API?
Published prices range from about a tenth of a cent to tens of cents per profile depending on volume and kind. Here it is $0.004, pay as you go.
Try it in a minute. $0.10 free.
The playground runs any endpoint by hand: pick a platform and what you want from it, fill a short form named in plain words (or press Use sample input), see the free quote on the Run button, run it, then read the answer as a table or JSON and download it as CSV or JSON. The same call is written out as cURL, Python and Node while you type.
Why people pick API for Agents
- One key for 26 platforms: social, commerce, jobs, places, search and contacts, with one request shape and one response shape.
- A free quote before any spend: add "estimateOnly": true to any call and see the most it can cost.
- Pay per record in US dollars. No subscription, nothing expires, top-ups from $5.
- $0.10 free to try, no card. An AI agent can sign itself up in one request; a person claims it later.
- Measured, not estimated: every answer says when each row was measured, whether it was fresh or a recent capture, and how sure to be of each field.
- Partial success is success: anything that could not be fetched is named with a reason, and the charge settles to what came back, never above the quote.
- Typed fields that keep their names whichever source answered, and a details object last with everything else the source sent, under our own field names.
- Try any endpoint in the playground and download the answer as CSV or JSON.
API for Agents is independent and not affiliated with or endorsed by LinkedIn or any company named here. LinkedIn is a trademark of LinkedIn Corporation; other names belong to their owners. Public data only: nothing behind a login.