Live Feed API

Introduction

The BuiltWith WebSocket Live Feed API provides real-time technology detection notifications via WebSocket connections. Subscribe to technology channels and receive instant updates when websites adopt or change technologies.

Connect to the WebSocket endpoint:
wss://sync.builtwith.com/wss/new?KEY=00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000

Or connect and auto-subscribe to a technology channel:
wss://sync.builtwith.com/wss/channel/Shopify?KEY=00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000

Key Features:

Real-time technology detection notifications
Subscribe to specific technologies (e.g., Shopify, WordPress) or the 'new' channel for entirely new websites
Trial/preview users receive redacted domain names to experience the feed
Automatic reconnection support

Plan Requirements:

You need an active plan to use the Live Feed API
Basic: up to 2 technology subscriptions per API key
Pro: up to 50 technology subscriptions per API key
Trial and expired accounts receive obfuscated data

View Plans

Authentication

WebSocket connections require your API key as a query parameter.

Parameter	Description	Required
`KEY`	`00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000` Your BuiltWith API key (GUID format)	Yes
`SUBSCRIBE`	`Shopify` or `new` Optional: Auto-subscribe to a channel on connect (used with /wss/channel/{tech} endpoint)	No

View Modes:

Full Access: Active paid subscribers receive complete domain names
Redacted/Preview: Trial users and expired subscriptions receive redacted domains (e.g., 'great.com' becomes 'grxxt.cxm')

WebSocket Endpoints

Endpoint	Description
`wss://sync.builtwith.com/wss/new`	Connect to the live feed. After connecting, send subscribe commands to join channels.
`wss://sync.builtwith.com/wss/channel/{tech}`	Connect and automatically subscribe to a specific technology channel (e.g., /wss/channel/Shopify)

Client Commands

Send these JSON commands after connecting to manage your subscriptions

Command	Description
`{"action":"subscribe","channel":"Shopify"}`	Subscribe to a technology channel. Use technology names like 'Shopify', 'WordPress', or use domain rule channels like 'new', 'new-historical', and 'premium'.
`{"action":"subscribe","channel":"new"}`	Subscribe to domains classified by the 'new' rule: domain is newly created in this pipeline and all detected technologies have FirstDetected within the last 1 day.
`{"action":"subscribe","channel":"new-historical"}`	Subscribe to domains classified by the 'new-historical' rule: domain is newly created in this pipeline and all detected technologies have FirstDetected older than or equal to 1 day.
`{"action":"subscribe","channel":"premium"}`	Subscribe to domains classified by the 'premium' rule: domain is newly created, has at least one technology with priority > 0, and all detected technologies have FirstDetected within the last 1 day.
`{"action":"unsubscribe","channel":"Shopify"}`	Unsubscribe from a channel.
`{"action":"list_subscriptions"}`	List your current channel subscriptions.

Channel Types

Channel	Description
`new`	Rule channel. Domain is new to the pipeline and all technologies are recently first detected (within 1 day).
`new-historical`	Rule channel. Domain is new to the pipeline and all technologies are historically first detected (older than or equal to 1 day).
`premium`	Rule channel. Domain is new, has at least one technology with priority > 0, and all technologies are recently first detected (within 1 day).
`{technology_name}`	Subscribe to a specific technology by name (e.g., 'Shopify', 'WordPress', 'Google-Analytics'). Use names with - to replace spaces.

Message Formats

Server Messages

Messages received from the WebSocket server

Connection Confirmed

{
  "type": "connected",
  "message": "Connected successfully...",
  "available_commands": ["subscribe", "unsubscribe", "list_subscriptions"],
  "view_mode": "full"
}

Subscription Confirmed

{
  "type": "subscribed",
  "channel": "Shopify",
  "channel_id": "a1b2c3d4-..."
}

Technology Detection Message

{
  "type": "message",
  "channel": "Shopify",
  "channel_id": "a1b2c3d4-...",
  "data": {
    "channel_name": "Shopify",
    "website_domain": "example.com",
    "epoch_secs": 1770508800
  }
}

Status Change (subscription level changed)

{
  "type": "status_change",
  "view_mode": "full",
  "message": "Your subscription has been upgraded. You now have full data access."
}

Error Message

{
  "type": "error",
  "message": "Technology 'unknown-tech' not found"
}

Message Fields

Field	Description
`type`	Message type: connected, subscribed, unsubscribed, message, status_change, error, info
`channel`	The friendly channel name (e.g., 'Shopify', 'new')
`channel_id`	The internal channel ID (technology GUID or 'new')
`data`	The detection payload with channel_name, website_domain, and epoch_secs
`website_domain`	The domain where technology was detected (redacted for trial users)
`epoch_secs`	Unix epoch timestamp (seconds) for when the detection was queued
`view_mode`	'full' for paid subscribers, 'redacted (trial/preview)' for trial users

Special Domains

We maintain two lists of use for you when looking up domains. Ignore lists and BuiltWith Suffix lists.

Ignore List
This is our own internal list of domains we do not index. They are either blocked, contains too many misleading technologies or too many subdomains with user generated content.

BuiltWith Suffix List
This is based on the Public Suffix List but includes many additional entries for companies with subdomains that should be considered top level domains. This list provides us with better visibility for internal websites for example it brings northernbeaches.nsw.gov.au to the top level over nsw.gov.au.

Ignore Domains (XML, JSON or TXT)

https://api.builtwith.com/ignoresv1/api.json

Suffix Domains (XML, JSON or TXT)

https://api.builtwith.com/suffixv1/api.json

Error Codes

Note error messages in this format cannot be guaranteed, your implementation should also consider non-200 response codes as errors. The Lookup property will be null (json) or not provided (xml) if the error is server related. View all potential well-formed error codes.

Our standard terms cover the use all of our APIs.

In general, you can use the API to enhance your product in many ways. The only limitation is you cannot resell the data as-is or provide duplicate functionality to builtwith.com and its associated services.