Reddit Comments Tree contains valuable data -- comment text, authors, scores, depth, and more. Scraping this data directly means dealing with anti-bot detection, CAPTCHAs, IP rotation, and constantly breaking selectors. The Scavio API handles all of that and returns clean, structured JSON from a single POST request.
This tutorial shows you how to scrape Reddit Comments Tree using PHP and the Scavio API. By the end, you will have a working PHP script that fetches real-time Reddit Comments Tree data and parses the results.
Prerequisites
- PHP installed on your machine
- A Scavio API key (free tier includes 50 credits on signup -- no credit card required)
Step 1: Install Dependencies
cURL is built into PHP, so there is nothing to install.
# The cURL extension ships with PHPStep 2: Make Your First Reddit Comments Tree Search
Send a POST request to the Scavio Reddit Comments Tree API endpoint with your query. The API returns structured JSON with comment text, authors, scores, and more.
<?php
// Comments are fetched per post: get a post_id from POST /api/v1/reddit/search, or resolve
// a URL with POST /api/v1/reddit/post. Deeper replies come from POST
// /api/v1/reddit/post/comments/replies using a row's reply_cursor.
$apiKey = "sk_live_your_key";
$post_id = "t3_1u1143i";
$ch = curl_init("https://api.scavio.dev/api/v1/reddit/post/comments");
curl_setopt_array($ch, [
CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER => true,
CURLOPT_POST => true,
CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER => [
"Authorization: Bearer $apiKey",
"Content-Type: application/json",
],
CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS => json_encode(["post_id" => $post_id, "sort" => "TOP"]),
]);
$response = curl_exec($ch);
curl_close($ch);
$data = json_decode($response, true);
print_r($data);Step 3: Example Response
The API returns structured JSON. Here is an example response for a Reddit Comments Tree search:
{
"data": {
"comments": [
{
"comment_id": "t1_oz1h216",
"author": "vscoderCopilot",
"text": "Seems like C# to me or maybe they make a new lang for AI usage",
"score": 2,
"depth": 0,
"created_at": "2026-07-22T09:02:17.303000+0000",
"reply_cursor": null
}
],
"next_cursor": null,
"has_more": false
},
"response_time": 2050,
"credits_used": 1,
"credits_remaining": 4810
}Every field is structured and typed -- no HTML parsing, no CSS selectors, no regex extraction. Your PHP code can access any field directly.
Step 4: Full Working Example
Here is a complete, runnable PHP script that searches Reddit Comments Tree and prints the results:
<?php
/**
* Fetch Reddit Comments Tree data with the Scavio API.
* POST /api/v1/reddit/post/comments - rows come back under data.comments.
*/
// Comments are fetched per post: get a post_id from POST /api/v1/reddit/search, or resolve
// a URL with POST /api/v1/reddit/post. Deeper replies come from POST
// /api/v1/reddit/post/comments/replies using a row's reply_cursor.
const API_URL = "https://api.scavio.dev/api/v1/reddit/post/comments";
function fetch_reddit_comments_tree(string $post_id): array {
$apiKey = getenv("SCAVIO_API_KEY");
$ch = curl_init(API_URL);
curl_setopt_array($ch, [
CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER => true,
CURLOPT_POST => true,
CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER => [
"Authorization: Bearer $apiKey",
"Content-Type: application/json",
],
CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS => json_encode(["post_id" => $post_id, "sort" => "TOP"]),
]);
$response = curl_exec($ch);
$httpCode = curl_getinfo($ch, CURLINFO_HTTP_CODE);
curl_close($ch);
if ($httpCode !== 200) {
throw new Exception("Scavio API error: $httpCode");
}
return json_decode($response, true);
}
$data = fetch_reddit_comments_tree("t3_1u1143i");
echo json_encode($data, JSON_PRETTY_PRINT);Why Use Scavio Instead of Scraping Reddit Comments Tree Directly?
- No proxy management. Direct scraping requires rotating proxies to avoid IP bans. Scavio handles all of this server-side.
- No CAPTCHA solving. Reddit Comments Tree aggressively blocks automated requests. Scavio returns clean data every time.
- Structured JSON output. No HTML parsing or CSS selector maintenance. Get typed, consistent data from every request.
- Multi-platform in one API. Search Google, Amazon, YouTube, and Walmart from the same API key with the same authentication pattern.
- Free tier included. 50 credits on signup with no credit card required. Each search costs 1 credit.