Apollo.io does export, and the native route is simple: Search, select, Export, CSV. What catches people out is everything around that button: which rows cost credits, why the list stops at 2,500 rows, why a 10,000-person search cannot be selected in one go, and what to do when the plan’s credits run out halfway through a list. This guide walks through the native export first, then the credit and page limits, then the faster routes that exist outside Apollo for anyone who needs thousands of rows from a search they can already see.
The native export in five steps
- Run a search. In Apollo, open Search and choose People or Companies. Apply filters for title, location, industry, headcount, technology or keywords. The result count at the top of the list tells you how many records match.
- Select the rows. Tick individual rows, or tick the header checkbox to select all 25 rows on the current page. Apollo also offers a “select all” that extends across pages up to your plan’s selection limit; the hard ceiling on any selection is 50,000 records.
- Click Export. The Export button sits in the action bar above the results. Apollo asks whether to export the selected records or the full result set, and warns you how many credits the export will consume.
- Choose CSV. Apollo exports to CSV by default. You can also push the records to a list, a sequence or a connected CRM instead of a file.
- Download the file. Small exports download immediately. Larger exports run in the background and Apollo emails a link; the Export history page shows every file you have generated.
The steps above are current as of October 2026 and follow Apollo’s own help documentation; Apollo moves buttons occasionally, so if the labels differ slightly, look for Export in the action bar above the results.
What consumes credits
Apollo now bills everything through a single pool of unified credits, replacing the older system of separate export, email and mobile allowances (HeroHunt). Revealing or exporting an email costs 1 credit; a phone number costs 8. The annual allowances by plan, from Apollo’s own plan comparison, are:
| Plan | Unified credits a year | Emails if you reveal nothing else | Phones if you reveal nothing else |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | 900 | 900 | 112 |
| Basic | 30,000 | 30,000 | 3,750 |
| Professional | 48,000 | 48,000 | 6,000 |
| Organization | 72,000 | 72,000 | 9,000 |
One detail is unconfirmed: Apollo’s readable help articles do not say how many credits a CSV row costs when the email was revealed earlier, or whether a row with no revealed email costs anything. Run a 25-row test export and compare your credit balance before and after; that is the only reliable way to know what your account is charged.
The 25-per-page and 100-page caps
Apollo displays 25 results per page and stops at page 100, so the deepest you can reach in any single search is 2,500 records. A search that returns 40,000 people still only exposes the first 2,500 until you change the filters (Apollo Knowledge Base). This is a display cap, not a credit cap, and it applies to native export, extensions and paste-URL services alike. The way around it is to split the search: filter by one location at a time, one headcount band at a time, or one title group at a time, so that each slice returns under 2,500 rows, then export each slice. Separately, Apollo’s selection and people-search API cap is 50,000 records per request (Apollo API docs). The practical sequence is: split by filter to stay under 2,500 visible rows, export each slice, and dedupe the files on LinkedIn URL.
Does Apollo have import and export?
Yes, both. Import lives under the Import menu and accepts CSV files of contacts or accounts. Apollo maps your columns to its fields (name, title, company, email, LinkedIn URL and so on), creates the records in your workspace, and can enrich them against its database, which consumes credits per enriched contact. Export covers people, companies, saved lists and sequence contacts, to CSV or to connected CRMs such as HubSpot and Salesforce. The asymmetry people notice is that import is unlimited while export is credit-gated: you can upload 50,000 of your own contacts for free, but revealing or exporting Apollo’s emails for them is what costs credits.
Can you upload a CSV to Apollo.io?
Yes. Uploading a CSV is the standard way to enrich a list you already own. Prepare a file with a header row, go to Import, choose Contacts or Accounts, upload the CSV, and map each column to an Apollo field. Apollo then matches each row against its database and offers to reveal emails and phones for the matched contacts at the usual 1 credit per email and 8 per phone. A CSV upload is also how you bring an externally exported list, for example a verified file from Apollo Exporter, back into Apollo as a list for sequencing. Keep the LinkedIn URL column in your file; it is the most reliable match key Apollo has.
Faster routes for large exports
When the list is bigger than the credits or the page cap allow, three alternatives exist, and all of them operate outside Apollo’s terms of service, which prohibit automated extraction. Chrome extensions such as AoLeads and the Apollo Exporter extension by scrapejob (a different product from this site) page through results inside your browser for $6 to $13 a month, with reliability complaints and 24-hour account blocks reported in store reviews. Paste-URL services take the search URL and return a file: the Apollo Exporter paste-URL export runs through your own logged-in session via its Chrome extension, collects the same rows you see page by page, verifies every email before download, and bills per exported row at the per-1,000 price on /pricing, with 500 free credits on sign-up. Apify actors no longer scrape Apollo at all; the ones still listed query their own databases. The methods are compared on cost and risk in how to scrape Apollo.
What the exported file contains
A native Apollo CSV carries the fields visible in the search grid plus a set of IDs and metadata columns. An Apollo Exporter file carries the 25 standard Apollo people fields: first and last name, title, company, company LinkedIn URL, person LinkedIn URL, email, email status, phone where Apollo displays one, city, state, country, industry, headcount, website, and the remaining standard columns, in CSV or XLSX. Email status is the field to watch: Apollo’s own 98% accuracy claim is not what third-party tests find, and a 2026 study of 100,000 Apollo exports measured 73.2% valid, 18.4% catch-all and 5.8% invalid (BounceZero). Verification before outreach is covered in Apollo database accuracy.