Is it legal to collect public Xiaohongshu and Douyin data through a third-party API? (2026)
There is no one-line answer, and we will not give you a verdict: it turns on what is taken and how, whether it holds personal information, and what you do with it. This is not legal advice; for your own use, ask a lawyer. Below are the points to look at and what DataXAPI does. DataXAPI reads Xiaohongshu (RedNote) with 21 endpoints, from $0.0200 a call; a failed call is not charged.
Updated 2026-11-04
What to look at
These are general points, for a conversation with your lawyer.
| Point | What it is about |
|---|---|
| What is taken, and how | Whether the content is public, and whether sign-in, access or payment limits are got around |
| Personal information | Public content can hold it. China's Personal Information Protection Law, article 27, allows handling information people made public themselves within a reasonable range, unless they clearly refuse, and asks for consent where it greatly affects them |
| What you do with it | Reading it for your own research differs from republishing it, reselling it, building a database or training a model on it |
| The platform's terms | Xiaohongshu's and Douyin's user agreements restrict scraping their content, and Douyin's also restricts commercial use without authorisation. Whether and how these reach you is a question for your lawyer |
What DataXAPI does
It takes public data only: no private accounts, private messages or deleted content. It uses no account or cookie of yours, and our policy tells you not to submit platform passwords, cookies or private logins.
DataXAPI is not an official service of Xiaohongshu or Douyin, and a call that works is not the platform's permission. Our policy does not allow building files on individuals, tracking people, or reselling access as it is. Anyone whose rights are affected can send a complaint without an account. A call's result can be read again by its request_id for 24 hours.
What stays with you
From our acceptable use policy: “Access to data does not by itself grant rights to redistribute, resell or train on the underlying content.” Take only what your use needs, and check the basis for that use yourself.
Endpoints
Each with its price; every page has the parameters, the fields and a recorded response.
Sources
What this page says of other services is from their own pages and documents, read on 2026-11-04. Prices and features change: check the source before you decide.