tRakt

tRakt lets you retrieve data from trakt.tv, a site similar to IMDb with a wider focus, yet smaller user base. The site also enables media-center integration, so you can automatically sync your collection and watch progress, as well as scrobble playback and ratings via Plex, Kodi and streaming services like Netflix and AppleTV+.
And, most importantly, trakt.tv has a publicly available API, which makes this package possible and allows you to collect all that nice data people have contributed.

Please note that while this package is basically an API-client, it is a little more opinionated and might deliver results that do not exactly match the data delivered by the API. The primary motivation for this package is to retrieve data that is easily processable for data analysis and display, which is why it tries hard to coerce most data into tabular form instead of using nested lists, which is what the direct translation of the API results would look like.

Installation

Get it from GitHub:

if (!("pak" %in% installed.packages())) {
  install.packages("pak")
}
pak::pak("jemus42/tRakt")

…or from r-universe:

install.packages("tRakt", repos = "https://jemus42.r-universe.dev")

Usage

library(tRakt)
library(dplyr) # for convenience

Search for a specific show from 2013 (and not the US adaptation) and get basic info:

show_info <- search_query("Utopia", year = "2013", type = "show")
glimpse(show_info)
#> Rows: 1
#> Columns: 9
#> $ type  <chr> "show"
#> $ score <dbl> 98.53947
#> $ title <chr> "Utopia"
#> $ year  <int> 2013
#> $ trakt <chr> "46241"
#> $ slug  <chr> "utopia"
#> $ tvdb  <chr> "264991"
#> $ imdb  <chr> "tt2384811"
#> $ tmdb  <chr> "46511"

We’ll use the $trakt ID for subsequent requests.

Get season information for the show using its trakt ID:

seasons_summary(show_info$trakt, extended = "full") |>
  glimpse()
#> Rows: 2
#> Columns: 13
#> $ season         <int> 1, 2
#> $ rating         <dbl> 8.45536, 8.06542
#> $ votes          <int> 336, 214
#> $ episode_count  <int> 6, 6
#> $ aired_episodes <int> 6, 6
#> $ title          <chr> "Season 1", "Season 2"
#> $ overview       <chr> "When a group of strangers find themselves in possessio…
#> $ first_aired    <dttm> 2013-01-15 21:00:00, 2014-07-14 20:00:00
#> $ updated_at     <dttm> 2025-03-16 04:14:25, 2025-03-16 04:14:25
#> $ network        <chr> "Channel 4", "Channel 4"
#> $ trakt          <chr> "56008", "56009"
#> $ tvdb           <chr> "507598", "524149"
#> $ tmdb           <chr> "54695", "54696"

Get episode data for the first season, this time using the show’s URL slug:

seasons_episodes(show_info$trakt, seasons = 1, extended = "full") |>
  glimpse()
#> Rows: 6
#> Columns: 17
#> $ season                 <int> 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1
#> $ episode                <int> 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
#> $ title                  <chr> "Episode 1", "Episode 2", "Episode 3", "Episode…
#> $ episode_abs            <int> 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
#> $ overview               <chr> "When  five strangers from an online comic book…
#> $ rating                 <dbl> 8.15410, 8.04485, 8.03160, 8.00973, 8.14578, 8.…
#> $ votes                  <int> 1220, 981, 886, 822, 782, 806
#> $ comment_count          <int> 9, 0, 1, 2, 1, 2
#> $ first_aired            <dttm> 2013-01-15 21:00:00, 2013-01-22 21:00:00, 2013-…
#> $ updated_at             <dttm> 2025-03-16 07:11:31, 2025-03-15 11:14:59, 2025-…
#> $ available_translations <list> <"de", "en", "es", "fr", "he", "nl", "pl", "ru"…
#> $ runtime                <int> 60, 49, 51, 48, 49, 62
#> $ episode_type           <chr> "series_premiere", "standard", "standard", "sta…
#> $ trakt                  <chr> "1405053", "1405054", "1405055", "1405056", "14…
#> $ tvdb                   <chr> "4471351", "4477746", "4477747", "4477748", "4…
#> $ imdb                   <chr> "tt2618234", "tt2618232", "tt2618236", "tt2618…
#> $ tmdb                   <chr> "910003", "910004", "910005", "910006", "91000…

You cann also get episode data for all seasons, but note that episodes will be included as a list-column and need further unpacking:

seasons_summary(show_info$trakt, episodes = TRUE, extended = "full") |>
  pull(episodes) |>
  bind_rows() |>
  glimpse()
#> Rows: 12
#> Columns: 17
#> $ season                 <int> 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2
#> $ episode                <int> 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
#> $ title                  <chr> "Episode 1", "Episode 2", "Episode 3", "Episode…
#> $ episode_abs            <int> 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12
#> $ overview               <chr> "When  five strangers from an online comic book…
#> $ rating                 <dbl> 8.15410, 8.04485, 8.03160, 8.00973, 8.14578, 8.…
#> $ votes                  <int> 1220, 981, 886, 822, 782, 806, 804, 700, 674, 6…
#> $ comment_count          <int> 9, 0, 1, 2, 1, 2, 5, 1, 2, 2, 2, 6
#> $ first_aired            <dttm> 2013-01-15 21:00:00, 2013-01-22 21:00:00, 2013-…
#> $ updated_at             <dttm> 2025-03-16 07:11:31, 2025-03-15 11:14:59, 2025-…
#> $ available_translations <list> <"de", "en", "es", "fr", "he", "nl", "pl", "ru"…
#> $ runtime                <int> 60, 49, 51, 48, 49, 62, 54, 51, 50, 50, 50, 53
#> $ episode_type           <chr> "series_premiere", "standard", "standard", "sta…
#> $ trakt                  <chr> "1405053", "1405054", "1405055", "1405056", "1…
#> $ tvdb                   <chr> "4471351", "4477746", "4477747", "4477748", "4…
#> $ imdb                   <chr> "tt2618234", "tt2618232", "tt2618236", "tt2618…
#> $ tmdb                   <chr> "910003", "910004", "910005", "910006", "910007…

Or alternatively, get the trending shows:

shows_trending()
#> # A tibble: 10 × 8
#>    watchers title                  year trakt  slug            tvdb  imdb  tmdb 
#>       <int> <chr>                 <int> <chr>  <chr>           <chr> <chr> <chr>
#>  1    13850 Severance              2022 154997 severance       3719… tt11… 95396
#>  2     7361 Reacher                2022 155536 reacher         3669… tt92… 1089…
#>  3     4956 Invincible             2021 172648 invincible-2021 3682… tt67… 95557
#>  4     4713 Solo Leveling          2024 193023 solo-leveling   3895… tt21… 1275…
#>  5     4168 The Pitt               2025 232884 the-pitt        4481… tt31… 2503…
#>  6     3936 The White Lotus        2021 168471 the-white-lotus 3904… tt13… 1118…
#>  7     3601 The Wheel of Time      2021 140100 the-wheel-of-t… 3557… tt74… 71914
#>  8     3356 Daredevil: Born Again  2025 195845 daredevil-born… 4227… tt18… 2025…
#>  9     2631 S.W.A.T.               2017 119137 s-w-a-t-2017    3286… tt61… 71790
#> 10     2509 Adolescence            2025 230892 adolescence     4524… tt31… 2490…

Maybe you just want to know how long it would take you to binge through these shows:

shows_trending(extended = "full") |>
  transmute(
    show = glue::glue("{title} ({year})"),
    runtime_hms = hms::hms(minutes = runtime),
    aired_episodes = aired_episodes,
    runtime_aired = hms::hms(minutes = runtime * aired_episodes)
  ) |>
  knitr::kable(
    col.names = c("Show", "Episode Runtime", "Aired Episodes", "Total Runtime (aired)")
  )

Show	Episode Runtime	Aired Episodes	Total Runtime (aired)
Severance (2022)	00:42:00	18	12:36:00
Reacher (2022)	00:49:00	22	17:58:00
Invincible (2021)	00:42:00	24	16:48:00
Solo Leveling (2024)	00:24:00	23	09:12:00
The Pitt (2025)	00:42:00	11	07:42:00
The White Lotus (2021)	00:42:00	17	11:54:00
The Wheel of Time (2021)	01:05:00	19	20:35:00
Daredevil: Born Again (2025)	00:42:00	3	02:06:00
S.W.A.T. (2017)	00:43:00	156	111:48:00
Adolescence (2025)	00:42:00	4	02:48:00

Please note though that episode runtime data may be inaccurate. In my experience, recent shows have fairly accurate runtime data, which is often not the case for older shows.

Credentials

The API requires at least a client id for the API calls.
Loading the package (or calling its functions via tRakt:: wil automatically set the app’s credentials for authentication, but for extended use you should set your own credentials via environment variables in your .Renviron like this:

# tRakt
trakt_client_id=12fc1de7[...]3d629afdf2
trakt_client_secret=justabunchofstuffhere

• trakt_client_id Required. It’s used in the HTTP headers for the API calls, which is kind of a biggie.
• trakt_client_secret: Optional(ish). This is only required if you intend to make an authenticated request, which is only required by a small number of implemented API methods (see vignette("Implemented-API-methods")). You can use this package perfectly fine for basic data collection and you can authenticate using the package’s credentials without registering an application on trakt.tv.

To get your credentials, you have to have an (approved) app over at trakt.tv.

You theoretically never need to supply your own credentials. However, if you want to actually use this package for some project, I do not recommend relying on the package’s credentials due to API rate limits. In any case, trakt.tv is free.
Be nice to their servers.

Code of Conduct

Please note that the tRakt project is released with a Contributor Code of Conduct. By contributing to this project, you agree to abide by its terms.