Guide
LinkedIn scrapers: what LinkedIn allows in 2026, and the alternatives
A LinkedIn scraper is software that copies profiles, posts or search results out of LinkedIn. LinkedIn's User Agreement forbids it, LinkedIn restricts accounts that use it, and the best-known court case ended against the scraper. Here is what the rules say, from LinkedIn's own pages and the court record, and what to use instead for the data you actually need.
By Lempile · Updated
What LinkedIn's rules say
LinkedIn's User Agreement (effective 3 November 2025) lists what members agree not to do in section 8.2. Two of those items cover scrapers directly: using software, scripts, crawlers or browser extensions to scrape or copy LinkedIn, profiles included; and using bots or other unauthorized automated methods to access LinkedIn, add or download contacts, send messages or engage with posts.
LinkedIn's Help Center spells out what that means in practice. Its prohibited software page says LinkedIn doesn't permit crawlers, bots, browser plug-ins or extensions that scrape, change how LinkedIn looks, or automate activity on it, and that members who use them risk having their accounts restricted or shut down. Its page on automated activity adds that such software may also break privacy laws in some countries, and that a restricted account comes back once the tool is disabled, at the time given in the notice.
What the hiQ case settled
hiQ Labs built a business on scraping public LinkedIn profiles, and the two companies fought in court from 2017. The case ended with a stipulated consent judgment filed on 6 December 2022 (N.D. Cal., No. 17-cv-03301-EMC). In it, hiQ accepted liability under California law for trespass to chattels and misappropriation, a $500,000 judgment, and a permanent injunction against accessing LinkedIn by automated means to copy its data, logged in to an account or not, without LinkedIn's written permission. hiQ also had to delete its scraping code and the data it had collected.
A settlement isn't a ruling that sets a rule for everyone, and none of this is legal advice. But it shows how LinkedIn treats scraping at scale, and why tools that promise "safe" scraping can't promise much.
What to use instead, by the data you need
| You need | Use | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Your own LinkedIn data: connections, messages, posts | LinkedIn's Download your data | Official, free, and minutes to 24 hours away |
| Sign users in, or post on their behalf | LinkedIn's official APIs | Sign In and Share are open to every developer |
| Sales Navigator inside a CRM | SNAP, LinkedIn's partner program | Official, but closed to new partners for now |
| Your users' own inboxes, networks and posts, from your product | An account-based API, such as Lempile | Each user connects their own account, at a human pace |
| Bulk data on people you have no relationship with | Nothing we'd recommend | It's what LinkedIn forbids and what hiQ was enjoined from |
Where account-based APIs fit
An account-based API, Lempile among them, doesn't crawl LinkedIn. Each of your users connects their own LinkedIn account, and the API reads and acts as that member, in their own session: their profile views, their inbox, their invitations, their posts and comments, and the searches they could run themselves. That's the right tool when your product works for its users on LinkedIn, and the wrong one for building a database of strangers.
It doesn't take the User Agreement off the table. Section 8.2 also restricts unauthorized automated methods, so the member who connects an account takes on the risk of a restriction. A careful provider keeps that risk low: Lempile keeps each account on its own session and IP, makes one call at a time 1.5 to 3 seconds apart, stops at 1,500 calls and 150 writes a day, and rests 15 minutes whenever LinkedIn asks an account to slow down. None can remove the risk. More in LinkedIn connection and invitation limits.
If you're evaluating a scraper anyway
- Whose account does it use? If it signs in as you, your account carries the risk. If it uses accounts it created, those are fake identities, which section 8.2 forbids and the hiQ injunction names.
- How fast does it go? Volume and speed are what get accounts restricted. A tool that sells thousands of profiles an hour isn't acting like a person.
- What happens to the data? Profiles are personal data, and LinkedIn notes that automation may break privacy laws in some countries. Know where the data goes and how long it's kept.
- What if it stops working? LinkedIn says prohibited tools may stop working without notice, so don't build a product on one.