> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://developers.oxylabs.io/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://developers.oxylabs.io/products/web-scraper-api/integration-methods/realtime.md).

# Realtime

Realtime integration for the Web Scraper API by Oxylabs. Keep the HTTPS connection open from job submission until results or an error are returned, using JSON-formatted payloads.

Realtime is a synchronous integration method. It **requires keeping the connection open** until the job is finished successfully or returns an error. It's the quickest method to implement; for large amounts of data, use [**Push-Pull**](/products/web-scraper-api/integration-methods/push-pull.md) instead.

## Job Submission

### Endpoint

The Realtime API endpoint for job submission is:

```
POST https://realtime.oxylabs.io/v1/queries
```

### Input

Provide the job parameters in a JSON payload as shown in the examples below. Python and PHP examples include comments for clarity.

{% tabs %}
{% tab title="cURL" %}

```shell
curl --user "USERNAME:PASSWORD" \
'https://realtime.oxylabs.io/v1/queries' \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"source": "universal", "url": "https://example.com", "geo_location": "United States"}'
```

{% endtab %}

{% tab title="Python" %}

```python
import requests
from pprint import pprint


# Structure payload.
payload = {
    "source": "universal", # Source you choose e.g. "universal"
    "url": "https://example.com", # Check the docs of the specific source you're using to see if you should use "url" or "query"
    "geo_location": "United States", # Some sources accept post codes and/or coordinates
    #"render" : "html", # Uncomment if you want to render JavaScript on the page
    #"render" : "png", # Uncomment if you want to take a screenshot of a scraped web page
    #"parse" : True, # Check what sources support parsed data
}

# Get response.
response = requests.request(
    'POST',
    'https://realtime.oxylabs.io/v1/queries',
    auth=('YOUR_USERNAME', 'YOUR_PASSWORD'), #Your credentials go here
    json=payload,
)

# Instead of response with job status and results url, this will return the
# JSON response with results.
pprint(response.json())
```

{% endtab %}

{% tab title="PHP" %}

```php
<?php

$params = array(
    'source' => 'universal', //Source you choose e.g. "universal"
    'url' => 'https://example.com', // Check the docs of the specific source you're using to see if you should use "url" or "query"
    'geo_location' => 'United States', //Some sources accept zip-code or coordinates
    //'render' => 'html', // Uncomment if you want to render JavaScript within the page
    //'render' => 'png', // Uncomment if you want to take a screenshot of a scraped web page
    //'parse' => TRUE, // Check what sources support parsed data
);

$ch = curl_init();

curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, "https://realtime.oxylabs.io/v1/queries");
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, json_encode($params));
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POST, 1);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_USERPWD, "YOUR_USERNAME" . ":" . "YOUR_PASSWORD"); //Your credentials go here

$headers = array();
$headers[] = "Content-Type: application/json";
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, $headers);

$result = curl_exec($ch);
echo $result;

if (curl_errno($ch)) {
    echo 'Error:' . curl_error($ch);
}
curl_close($ch);
```

{% endtab %}

{% tab title="C#" %}

```csharp
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Net.Http;
using System.Net.Http.Json;
using System.Threading.Tasks;

namespace OxyApi
{
    class Program
    {
        static async Task Main()
        {
            const string Username = "YOUR_USERNAME";
            const string Password = "YOUR_PASSWORD";

            var parameters = new Dictionary<string, string>()
            {
                { "source", "universal" },
                { "url", "https://example.com" },
                { "geo_location", "United States" },
            };


            var client = new HttpClient();

            Uri baseUri = new Uri("https://realtime.oxylabs.io");
            client.BaseAddress = baseUri;

            var requestMessage = new HttpRequestMessage(HttpMethod.Post, "/v1/queries");
            requestMessage.Content = JsonContent.Create(parameters);

            var authenticationString = $"{Username}:{Password}";
            var base64EncodedAuthenticationString = Convert.ToBase64String(System.Text.ASCIIEncoding.UTF8.GetBytes(authenticationString));
            requestMessage.Headers.Add("Authorization", "Basic " + base64EncodedAuthenticationString);

            var response = await client.SendAsync(requestMessage);
            var contents = await response.Content.ReadAsStringAsync();

            Console.WriteLine(contents);
        }
    }
}
```

{% endtab %}

{% tab title="Golang" %}

```go
package main

import (
	"bytes"
	"encoding/json"
	"fmt"
	"io/ioutil"
	"net/http"
)

func main() {
	const Username = "YOUR_USERNAME"
	const Password = "YOUR_PASSWORD"

	payload := map[string]string{
		"source": "universal",
		"url": "https://example.com",
		"geo_location": "United States",
	}

	jsonValue, _ := json.Marshal(payload)

	client := &http.Client{}
	request, _ := http.NewRequest("POST",
		"https://realtime.oxylabs.io/v1/queries",
		bytes.NewBuffer(jsonValue),
	)

	request.SetBasicAuth(Username, Password)
	response, _ := client.Do(request)

	responseText, _ := ioutil.ReadAll(response.Body)
	fmt.Println(string(responseText))
}

```

{% endtab %}

{% tab title="Java" %}

```java
package org.example;

import okhttp3.*;
import org.json.JSONObject;

public class Main implements Runnable {
    private static final String AUTHORIZATION_HEADER = "Authorization";
    public static final String USERNAME = "YOUR_USERNAME";
    public static final String PASSWORD = "YOUR_PASSWORD";

    public void run() {
        JSONObject jsonObject = new JSONObject();
        jsonObject.put("source", "universal");
        jsonObject.put("url", "https://example.com");
        jsonObject.put("geo_location", "United States");

        Authenticator authenticator = (route, response) -> {
            String credential = Credentials.basic(USERNAME, PASSWORD);

            return response
                    .request()
                    .newBuilder()
                    .header(AUTHORIZATION_HEADER, credential)
                    .build();
        };

        var client = new OkHttpClient.Builder()
                .authenticator(authenticator)
                .build();

        var mediaType = MediaType.parse("application/json; charset=utf-8");
        var body = RequestBody.create(jsonObject.toString(), mediaType);
        var request = new Request.Builder()
                .url("https://realtime.oxylabs.io/v1/queries")
                .post(body)
                .build();

        try (var response = client.newCall(request).execute()) {
            assert response.body() != null;
            System.out.println(response.body().string());
        } catch (Exception exception) {
            System.out.println("Error: " + exception.getMessage());
        }

        System.exit(0);
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        new Thread(new Main()).start();
    }
}

```

{% endtab %}

{% tab title="Node.js" %}

```javascript
import fetch from 'node-fetch';

const username = 'YOUR_USERNAME';
const password = 'YOUR_PASSWORD';
const body = {
  source: 'universal',
  url: 'https://example.com',
  geo_location: 'United States'
};
const response = await fetch('https://realtime.oxylabs.io/v1/queries', {
  method: 'post',
  body: JSON.stringify(body),
  headers: {
    'Content-Type': 'application/json',
    'Authorization': 'Basic ' + Buffer.from(`${username}:${password}`).toString('base64'),
  }
});

console.log(await response.json());
```

{% endtab %}
{% endtabs %}

### Output

Realtime API supports these result types in the output:

* **HTML**: The raw HTML content scraped from the target webpage;
* **JSON**: Structured data parsed from the HTML content, formatted in JSON format;
* **PNG**: Base64-encoded screenshot of the rendered page in PNG format.
* **XHR:** [XHR requests](/products/web-scraper-api/features/result-processing-and-storage/output-types/capturing-network-requests-fetch-xhr.md) made while loading the page.
* **Markdown:** [Markdown](/products/web-scraper-api/features/result-processing-and-storage/output-types/markdown-output.md) of a web page.

This table explains the default result types based on the parameters included in the payload of the API request:

| Render parameter | Parse parameter | Default output |
| ---------------- | --------------- | -------------- |
| -                | -               | html           |
| `html`           | -               | html           |
| `png`            | -               | png            |
| -                | `true`          | json           |
| `html`           | `true`          | json           |
| `png`            | `true`          | png            |

By default, Realtime returns only the **default output** for your payload. To receive one or more of the available outputs instead, add the `type` query parameter to the endpoint, as shown below. Each requested type is returned as a separate entry in the `results` array. This is the [**multiple result types**](/products/web-scraper-api/features/result-processing-and-storage/output-types/multi-format-output.md) feature, and it works the same way in Realtime and [**Push-Pull**](/products/web-scraper-api/integration-methods/push-pull.md).

```
POST https://realtime.oxylabs.io/v1/queries?type=raw,parsed,png
```

{% hint style="info" %}
Some sources have a [dedicated parser](/products/web-scraper-api/features/result-processing-and-storage/dedicated-parsers.md); use `parse: true` with those. For any other target, use [Custom Parser.](/products/web-scraper-api/features/custom-parser.md) Every parsed result carries a `parse_status_code`; see [response codes](/products/web-scraper-api/response-codes.md#parsers) for what each value means.
{% endhint %}

#### Output example:

```json
{
  "results": [
    {
      "content": "<!doctype html><html lang=\"en\"><head><title>Example Domain</title></head><body>CONTENT</body></html>",
      "created_at": "2026-08-21 13:00:20",
      "updated_at": "2026-08-21 13:00:21",
      "page": 1,
      "url": "https://example.com",
      "job_id": "7496551765458818050",
      "is_render_forced": false,
      "type": "raw",
      "status_code": 200
    }
  ]
}
```

{% hint style="info" %}
The response also includes `_request`, `_response`, and `session_info` objects, omitted here for brevity. When `parse` is used, `parser_type` and `parser_preset` are returned as well.
{% endhint %}


---

# Agent Instructions
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## Querying This Documentation
If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question.

Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter, and the optional `goal` query parameter:

```
GET https://developers.oxylabs.io/products/web-scraper-api/integration-methods/realtime.md?ask=<question>&goal=<endgoal>
```

`ask` is the immediate question: it should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language.
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