How to Monitor TikTok Trends With an API
To monitor TikTok trends, run the same hashtag, sound or keyword collection on a schedule, for example every 6 hours, store each video's ID and numbers, and alert when the count of new videos or their views jumps.
To monitor TikTok trends, run the same hashtag, sound or keyword collection on a schedule, for example every 6 hours, store each video’s ID and numbers, and alert when the count of new videos or their views jumps. apidojo’s TikTok Scraper on Apify returns the newest videos with sortType: DATE_POSTED, at $0.30 per 1,000 posts.
A one-time look at Creative Center tells you what’s trending today; a monitor tells you what started trending since yesterday, in your niche. This hub covers the setup, the growth signals, alerts and costs, and links to the use cases built on it. Finding trends by hand is covered in how to find trends on TikTok.
What Should a TikTok Trend Monitor Track?
Track 3 kinds of input: hashtags, sounds and keywords, each with its own growth signal. The table shows the input and what to watch.
| Input | apidojo input | Growth signal |
|---|---|---|
| Hashtag | startUrls: https://www.tiktok.com/tag/name |
New videos per day |
| Sound | startUrls: the sound’s music URL |
New videos using it per day |
| Keyword | keywords with sortType: DATE_POSTED |
New videos and their views per day |
Input types are documented on the actor’s page (Apify).
How Do You Build a TikTok Trend Monitor in Python?
Collect the newest videos for each input, keep the IDs you’ve seen, and record daily counts so you can compare today with the days before.
import json, os, pathlib, datetime as dt
from apify_client import ApifyClient
WATCH = {
"#booktok": {"startUrls": ["https://www.tiktok.com/tag/booktok"]},
"cozy fantasy": {"keywords": ["cozy fantasy"], "sortType": "DATE_POSTED"},
}
STATE = pathlib.Path("trend_state.json")
state = json.loads(STATE.read_text()) if STATE.exists() else {}
client = ApifyClient(os.environ["APIFY_TOKEN"])
today = dt.date.today().isoformat()
for name, run_input in WATCH.items():
run = client.actor("apidojo/tiktok-scraper").call(run_input={**run_input, "maxItems": 200})
s = state.setdefault(name, {"seen": [], "daily": {}})
new = [v for v in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items() if v["id"] not in s["seen"]]
s["seen"] = (s["seen"] + [v["id"] for v in new])[-5000:]
day = s["daily"].setdefault(today, {"videos": 0, "views": 0})
day["videos"] += len(new)
day["views"] += sum(v["views"] for v in new)
STATE.write_text(json.dumps(state))Run it with cron or an Apify schedule. The Python setup is in how to collect TikTok data with Python.
How Do You Tell When Something Starts Trending?
A trend starts when today’s new-video count is well above its recent average, for example 2 to 3 times the median of the previous 7 days. Listed below are the 3 signals worth alerting on.
- Volume spike: new videos per day jump above the recent median.
- View spike: views on new videos rise faster than the number of videos.
- New creators: many accounts that haven’t used the hashtag or sound before start using it.
Send alerts to Slack or email when a signal crosses your threshold, and review them before acting; a single viral video can trigger a false alarm.
What Does Monitoring TikTok Trends Cost?
Monitoring 10 hashtags 4 times a day, with up to 100 new videos per check, costs about $1.20 a day, or $36 over 30 days, on TikTok Scraper. For many small, frequent checks, apidojo’s TikTok Scraper API charges $0.006 per query, including the first 10 to 20 posts, then $0.0003 per post (Apify).
| Setup | Posts per day | TikTok Scraper per 30 days |
|---|---|---|
| 10 inputs, 4 checks a day, 100 posts each | 4,000 | $36 |
| 25 inputs, 2 checks a day, 100 posts each | 5,000 | $45 |
| 5 inputs, 1 check a day, 200 posts each | 1,000 | $9 |
What Can You Build on a TikTok Trend Monitor?
The same collect, store and compare loop powers 4 other use cases. Listed below are the guides.
Questions people ask
How often should you check for TikTok trends?
Every 6 to 12 hours catches most trends early; hourly suits fast-moving topics like news or launches.
Can you monitor TikTok trends by country?
Yes, add a location country code to each input.
Is TikTok Creative Center enough?
It's the best free overview, but it ranks broad trends; a monitor watches the exact hashtags, sounds and keywords in your niche.