Quickstart - Extralt Docs

This guide walks through one complete extraction: create a Robot, wait for it to become runnable, start a Run, and inspect the resulting Captures. Every step includes the dashboard workflow and its API equivalent.

Prerequisites

Create an account at extralt.com
Create an organization
Subscribe to a plan (Start includes a 7-day free trial with 5,000 credits)
Generate an API key from the dashboard (needed for API usage)

See Account Setup for detailed instructions.

Create a Robot

A Robot is the stable extraction resource for one host and country. Extralt builds and validates its internal crawler and scraper, then reuses the same Robot for later Runs.

• Dashboard: go to Extract > Robots > New, enter a product URL from the target site, select a country, and choose Create. The dashboard opens the details page for the returned Robot so you can monitor its status.

• API:

export EXTRALT_API_KEY="your-api-key"

curl -s -X POST "https://api.extralt.com/v1/extract/robots" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $EXTRALT_API_KEY" \
  -H "Idempotency-Key: quickstart-robot-1" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "url": "https://example-store.com/products/sample",
    "country_code": "US"
  }' | jq

The response contains the stable Robot ID and its status. 202 Accepted means the Robot was created and its build was queued. 200 OK means that Robot already existed. In both cases, id identifies the same Robot lifecycle.

For the following cURL examples, copy that ID into an environment variable:

export ROBOT_ID="<robot-id>"

For a compatible covered source, the response can return an existing Robot immediately. Otherwise, Extralt analyzes the source, generates extraction logic, validates it, and compiles it. Build time varies with the source and validation work required.

Wait for the Robot

• Dashboard: after creation, the Robot details page shows its live status. When the status is completed, the Robot becomes available in Run and Schedule selectors.

• API: poll the Robot until it completes.

curl -s "https://api.extralt.com/v1/extract/robots/$ROBOT_ID" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $EXTRALT_API_KEY" | jq '.status'

The ID does not change while the Robot builds. Use it to start Runs once the status is completed.

Start a Run

A Run uses a completed Robot to crawl pages and produce Captures.

• Dashboard: select Start Run on a completed Robot, or go to Extract > Runs > New. The selector shows only completed Robots. Enter optional start URLs and a crawl budget, then choose Start. The dashboard opens the new Run's details page.

• API:

curl -s -X POST "https://api.extralt.com/v1/extract/runs" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $EXTRALT_API_KEY" \
  -H "Idempotency-Key: quickstart-run-1" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "robot_id": "'$ROBOT_ID'",
    "start_urls": ["https://example-store.com/products/sample"],
    "budget": 10
  }' | jq

The response is 202 Accepted with { "id": "<run_id>" }. The Run receives the next name in the Robot's sequence, such as nike_com_US_1.

For the following cURL examples, copy the returned Run ID as well:

export RUN_ID="<run-id>"

View your captures

Once the run completes, your extracted data is ready.

• Dashboard: go to Extract > Captures, select your run from the filter, and browse the results. Click any row to see the full extraction data. You can export to JSONL or Parquet using the download button.

Captures table showing extracted product data

• API:

curl -s "https://api.extralt.com/v1/extract/captures?run_id=$RUN_ID" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $EXTRALT_API_KEY" | jq

Want to automate recurring extractions? Check out Schedules to run extractions on a cadence.

For the complete Robot and Run lifecycle, see Extracting data.

Continue through the pipeline

After the Run completes, you can:

start an Enrichment to create normalized Items;
inspect the data model and its source lineage;
use Explore once Enrich has published relationships;
ask the dashboard agent to query Captures or prepare the next operation for approval.