--- title: "Hacker News Integration" description: "Read-only access to Hacker News through its Firebase and Algolia APIs: fetch items and users, pull story-list feeds, hydrate front-page stories, and run full-text search. No credentials required." url: https://flowrunner.ai/integrations/hackernews date_modified: 2026-08-07T17:20:23-07:00 --- # Hacker News [Analytics & Data](https://flowrunner.ai/integrations/category/analytics-data) Read-only access to Hacker News through its Firebase and Algolia APIs: fetch items and users, pull story-list feeds, hydrate front-page stories, and run full-text search. No credentials required. [Verified](https://flowrunner.ai/integrations/verified "What does verified mean?") · 15 actions · No credentials · available [Hacker News website](https://news.ycombinator.com/) · [Platform Documentation](https://github.com/HackerNews/API) · Capability data verified 2026-07-14 1. A scheduled check fires for a monitored keyword 2. Agent runs Search by Date with a numeric filter for new stories 3. Agent reads each hit's title, points, comments, and URL 4. Agent flags stories that clear the relevance and score threshold 5. Agent confirms the match is on-topic, not a false positive 6. Agent drafts an internal summary of the flagged stories 7. Any external post or outreach based on a story waits for approval ## What This Integration Enables The Hacker News connector lets agents read Hacker News inside a workflow. Agents fetch individual items and users, pull the top, new, best, Ask, Show, and job story-list feeds, and hydrate the front page in a single call. The Algolia actions run full-text search by keyword, author, or content type, search by date with numeric filters over points and comment counts, and fetch a story with its entire nested comment thread at once. Because everything is read-only and unauthenticated, the connector is pure signal in; the surrounding flow decides what to summarize, log, or escalate. ### Without FlowRunner **Feed watched by hand**: Someone refreshes Hacker News and searches for a keyword ad hoc **Stories missed**: A relevant post scrolls off the front page before anyone sees it **Threads read manually**: Following a discussion means opening and re-reading it repeatedly ### With FlowRunner **Feed watched on a schedule**: The agent searches and reads the feeds automatically **Relevant stories surfaced**: On-topic posts above the score threshold become items a person sees **Threads fetched whole**: A full nested comment tree comes back in one call for summarization ## Use Case Scenarios ### Front-Page Digest On a schedule the agent calls Get Top Stories (Hydrated) to pull the current front page as full items, then posts the highest-scoring headlines with links to a team channel. The hydrated action returns the first N items in one call, so the digest is one request rather than a story-list of ids followed by dozens of lookups. ### Keyword Monitoring The agent watches for mentions of a product, company, or topic. Using Search by Date with a `created_at_i` numeric filter, it collects every new story matching the keyword, reads points and comment counts, and logs each hit to a monitoring sheet. Stories that clear the relevance and score threshold get flagged for a person; the rest are recorded for the trend. ### Trending Thread Summary When a discussion about the team's space starts trending, the agent calls Get Item (Algolia) to fetch the full nested comment tree in one call, then hands the thread to a summarization step. The summary lands in a community channel so the team follows the conversation without each person reading hundreds of comments. ## Human-in-Loop Highlight Reading Hacker News is safe. Acting on what you read, replying in public, posting a competitor's news externally, kicking off outreach, carries reputation risk the agent should not absorb alone. The connector is read-only, so the agent gathers signal freely, but the moment a story would drive an external action, it stops. When a monitored keyword surfaces a story that clears the threshold, the agent assembles the title, score, thread summary, and a proposed next step, then routes to the owner through their channel: "A post about our category is on the front page with 300 points and an active thread. I drafted a note for the community channel. Post it, or hold?" This is [human-in-the-loop](https://flowrunner.ai/concepts/human-in-the-loop) at the boundary between listening and speaking: the agent handles the reading and the summarizing, and a person owns what the organization says in public. Agent processes routinely Detects exception requiring judgment Clear match Continues automatically Ambiguous Routes to human via preferred channel Human decides Agent resumes with decision ## Agent Capabilities 15 actions ### Items & Users 3 - **Get Item** Fetch a single Hacker News item (story, comment, job, poll, or poll option) by numeric id. - **Get User** Fetch a Hacker News user profile including karma and submission history. - **Get Max Item ID** Return the current largest item id on Hacker News. ### Story Lists 8 - **Get Top Stories** Return the list of ids for the current top stories. - **Get New Stories** Return the list of ids for the newest stories. - **Get Best Stories** Return the list of ids for the best stories. - **Get Ask Stories** Return the list of ids for the Ask HN feed. - **Get Show Stories** Return the list of ids for the Show HN feed. - **Get Job Stories** Return the list of ids for the jobs feed. - **Get Updates** Return the change feed of recently updated items and profiles. - **Get Top Stories (Hydrated)** Fetch the first N top stories as full items in a single call. ### Search 4 - **Search** Run a full-text Algolia search by keyword, author, or content type. - **Search by Date** Run an Algolia search sorted by date with numeric filters over points, comments, or timestamp. - **Get Item (Algolia)** Fetch a story with its entire nested comment thread in one call. - **Get User (Algolia)** Fetch a hydrated user record from the Algolia API. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What can FlowRunner do with Hacker News? FlowRunner agents can run Get Item, Get User, and Get Max Item ID in Hacker News, plus 12 more actions. ### Does connecting Hacker News to FlowRunner require OAuth? No. Hacker News needs no credentials at all, so there is no key to obtain, store, or rotate. ### Can Hacker News trigger a FlowRunner workflow automatically? Hacker News doesn't currently expose triggers in FlowRunner. It connects as an action step inside workflows started by another trigger. **Work at Hacker News?** This integration exposes Hacker News to AI agents on every FlowRunner plan, including through MCP, at no cost to you. [See what FlowRunner offers integration partners](https://flowrunner.ai/integrations/partners), including how to keep this page current. --- Markdown version of https://flowrunner.ai/integrations/hackernews. Site index: https://flowrunner.ai/llms.txt