A Companies House API alternative for bulk UK company data and leads

The official Companies House API is free, well documented and the right starting point for most projects. It is also built for looking up companies one at a time, and it has limits that show up as soon as you try to build a list: a rate limit on requests, an API key to register and manage, and a search endpoint that stops returning results after a fixed number of hits. If you want every company in a SIC code and a town, with directors and a website next to each, you end up writing and maintaining a lot of code.

This page compares the options honestly and shows where the UK Companies Scraper fits. It is an unofficial tool that runs on Apify and reads public Companies House data.

The options for UK company data

• The official Companies House API. Free, authoritative, and ideal for checking a known company number, reading filings or powering a compliance check. You manage the key, the rate limit and the pagination yourself.
• The free bulk download. Companies House publishes a monthly basic company data file. It is free and complete for basic fields (name, number, status, SIC codes, address), but it has no officers, no persons with significant control, no websites and no contacts, and you must process a large file yourself.
• Commercial aggregators such as OpenCorporates. They cover many countries with one schema and are a good fit if you need a global picture. Their UK data is derived from the same register, and API access is sold in plans.
• The UK Companies Scraper on Apify. It searches by company number, SIC code or location, and returns one clean record per company with profile, officers and persons with significant control, charges and accounts dates. Optionally it finds the company’s website, emails and phones, which is what makes it useful for UK B2B lead lists. You pay per company, with no subscription.

Use the official API when you need one company, live filings or a free tier. Use the scraper when you need a list, in a spreadsheet, with contacts, and you would rather not build the pipeline.

What a record contains

Company number, name, status, type, incorporation and dissolution dates, registered office postcode, SIC codes with descriptions, accounts and confirmation statement due dates, previous names, flags for charges and insolvency history, company age, and direct links to the Companies House page and filing history. With contacts switched on, you also get the website and publicly listed business emails and phones.

A real example

From a sample run on 29 September 2026: a private limited company registered in Bristol, incorporated on 5 March 2020 and dissolved on 7 September 2021, SIC code 56101 (licensed restaurants). The register changes daily: these values are valid for that run only.

{
  "companyNumber": "12499918",
  "name": "PINK PONY LTD",
  "status": "dissolved",
  "companyType": "Private limited Company",
  "incorporatedOn": "2020-03-05",
  "dissolvedOn": "2021-09-07",
  "postcode": "BS10 7AA",
  "sicCodes": [{"code": "56101", "description": "Licensed restaurants"}],
  "hasCharges": false,
  "hasInsolvencyHistory": false,
  "ageYears": 6,
  "scrapedAt": "2026-09-29T13:25:47.118Z"
}

See the full sample output with the matching input.

Build a list in three steps

1. Set the filters: one or more SIC codes, a location such as Manchester, a maximum number of results, and whether to look for websites and contacts.
2. Run it in the Apify Console, on a schedule to catch new incorporations, or through the API.
3. Export the dataset as CSV, Excel or JSON, or send it to your CRM through a webhook, Make, Zapier or n8n.

{
  "sicCodes": ["43220"],
  "location": "Manchester",
  "maxItems": 100,
  "findContacts": true
}

AI agents can use the same tool through the Apify MCP server: https://mcp.apify.com?tools=euroscrape/uk-companies. See our MCP guide. The same approach works for other countries: see the French company list page or the businesses without a website guide.

Data protection

Company data is public, but officers are people. If you contact individuals, you remain responsible for complying with UK GDPR and PECR, including the rules on marketing to sole traders and partnerships. Business emails for limited companies are treated differently from personal ones; check the rules before any campaign.

Pricing

You pay per result, with no subscription: $0.003 to start a run, $0.004 per company, and $0.025 per company where a website and contacts were found (charged only when found). A list of 1,000 companies without contacts therefore costs about $4 in events. Apify subscribers get 10 to 30% off depending on their plan. Prices read from the actor’s pricing file on 8 November 2026.

FAQ

Is the Companies House API free? Yes, the official API is free to use with a key. It is rate limited and meant for lookups rather than bulk lists.

Is this scraper official? No. It is unofficial and reads public pages; Companies House remains the authoritative source.

Can I find new companies each week? Yes. Schedule a run filtered by SIC code or location and keep only recent incorporations.

Does it include directors? Yes, officers and persons with significant control are part of the company profile.

Can I search by SIC code? Yes, by one or several SIC codes, combined with a location.

Open the UK Companies Scraper on Apify