Key takeaways
- PullPush (pullpush.io) is a free community replacement for Pushshift, letting you search Reddit's full historical posts and comments by subreddit, author, keyword, and date.
- Search comments rather than posts, because complaint phrasing from target users usually appears in comment bodies, not post titles.
- Useful query filters include author:"username", subreddit:"SaaS", and selftext:"phrase" (or body:"phrase" for comments), plus score, date-range, and sort URL parameters.
- Search for the problem in users' own words, not your product category, and log recurring complaint threads to find the two subreddits worth 90% of your engagement effort.
- PullPush is safe for research but not for mass outreach: DMing scraped users violates Reddit's Self-Promotion policy and gets accounts suspended.
Pull push reddit search lets you query Reddit's full post and comment history for free, so you can stop spending three hours a day manually browsing and instead search exact phrases your target users complain about. This guide gives you copy-paste query syntax, date and score filters, and a Pushshift migration map.
What Is Pull Push Reddit Search and Why Does It Exist?
Pushshift's API shutdown, in one paragraph
Pushshift was the backend researchers and moderators used to search Reddit's full history. In 2023, Reddit cut off Pushshift's API access during the API pricing protests, and the moderator community documented the fallout in the ModCoord protest threads. Suddenly there was no free way to query years of posts and comments without scraping.
What PullPush does instead
PullPush (pullpush.io) rebuilt that capability as a community replacement: a searchable archive of Reddit posts and comments you can query by subreddit, author, keyword, and date. For a solo builder, it means you can find where your target users complain without spending 3 hours a day browsing manually. That research feeds everything else, from picking subreddits to building semantic authority on Reddit and AI search.
How Do You Run a PullPush Reddit Search Step by Step?
Go to pullpush.io. You'll see a search bar with a type toggle. That toggle is the whole interface: pick Post or Comment before you type anything, because the two indexes behave differently.
Searching posts vs comments
Posts are titles and selftext. Comments are where the real complaints live. A vibe coder hunting for "need a Reddit marketing tool" should search comments, since that phrasing rarely appears in a post title. Start broad: type the phrase, hit search, then narrow with the subreddit and date filters on the results page. Sort by newest first so you're reading live conversations, not archaeology.
Reading the results page
Each result shows author, subreddit, score, and a link to the original thread. Click through to reply. The score tells you whether the community upvoted the complaint, which is a rough signal of how many people feel the same pain. Log subreddits where the same complaint repeats; that's your target channel list.
Once you've found three subreddits where your buyers complain, the next problem is acting on it. That's the gap between research and shipping, and it's what a publish-and-iterate workflow is built to close.
Which PullPush Query Syntax Filters Actually Work?
PullPush accepts field filters written as field:"value" inside the search box, plus URL parameters on the results page. The filters that matter most for founder research are author, subreddit, and selftext. The PullPush.io documentation lists the full parameter set, but these three cover most workflows.
Author, subreddit, and selftext filters
author:"username"shows everything one person has posted or commented, useful when you find a vocal target user.subreddit:"SaaS"restricts results to a single community.selftext:"churned"searches post bodies for a phrase; on comments, usebody:"phrase"instead.
Score, date-range, and sort parameters
Append these to the URL rather than the query string:
| Parameter | What it does |
|---|---|
score=>10 | Hides low-engagement noise |
after=1680307200 / before=1682899200 | Unix timestamps bounding your window |
sort=desc&sort_type=score | Most-upvoted first |
size=100 | Max results per page |
Copy-paste query examples for founder research
subreddit:"SaaS" selftext:"first 100 users"— posts about early traction struggles.subreddit:"microsaas" author:"someone"— one founder's full history.selftext:"no users" subreddit:"EntrepreneurRideAlong" score=>5
One honest limitation: PullPush has no natural-language search, so you need to guess the exact phrases your users type. That guesswork is what high-intent searches build positioning before users — run the queries, log the recurring words, and those words become your landing-page copy.
Coming From Pushshift? Here's Your Migration Map
Parameter name changes
Most of your muscle memory carries over. The base URL becomes api.pullpush.io/reddit/search/submission/ (or /comment/ for comments), and core params like q, subreddit, author, after, and before work the same. Two renames to remember: score thresholds use the same field but PullPush is stricter about combining them with q, and Pushshift's size cap behaves differently, so paginate with before timestamps instead of cranking one giant request.
What Pushshift features have no PullPush equivalent
Aggregation endpoints (the old /aggregate/ counts per day) are gone, so frequency analysis means exporting and counting yourself. Bulk moderation logs and some metadata fields (edited flags, award data) are thinner. If your old workflow leaned on those, the export-then-spreadsheet route in the next section covers the gap. For turning what you find into actual replies, see https://heycatch.ai/blog/reddit-engagement-for-semantic-authority-a-48-hour-tutorial.
How Do You Export PullPush Results Without Writing Code?
Copy-paste into Sheets
PullPush returns JSON in your browser, so the no-code path is copy the URL, paste the results into a sheet, and split the text on commas. It works, but it breaks on titles containing commas and caps out fast on large result sets.
A cleaner route: use Google Sheets' IMPORTDATA or a small Apps Script that fetches the PullPush URL and writes each post's title, subreddit, and date to its own row. Ten minutes of setup, reusable forever.
Lightweight scraping options
No-code scrapers like Browse AI or Instant Data Scraper can pull structured rows straight from a rendered PullPush page. Whatever you export, remember the data is for research: Reddit's API terms restrict bulk collection and using scraped content for unsolicited outreach, so keep your exports to market research, not mass-DM lists.
Once you know which subreddits and complaint threads matter, a tool like HeyCatch can turn that research into a posting plan instead of another spreadsheet. For what happens after Reddit, see our AI search visibility guide.
What Should a Zero-User Founder Actually Search For?
Finding where your target users complain
Skip searching for your product category. Search for the problem in the words users use. If you shipped a habit tracker, query body:"can't stick to" subreddit:getdisciplined rather than "habit tracker". Complaint phrasing is the raw material for landing-page copy, Reddit replies, and your first content pieces. Run the same phrase across three or four subreddits and note which one returns the most hits per month, because that density tells you where the pain actually lives.
Mining competitor mentions
Search competitor names directly: author:NOT_ME "competitorname" in the subreddits where your users hang out. Sort by score:>5 to surface the comments people actually read, and filter created:> with a recent date so you only see current sentiment. Read what users praise, what they call missing, and whether they mention price. Each "I wish it did X" is a positioning line you can test before you write a single tweet.
Turning findings into a 90/10-rule engagement plan
Log every complaint thread in a spreadsheet with the subreddit, the exact phrasing, and the date. After 30 to 50 entries, patterns appear: three recurring problems, two subreddits that dominate, one phrasing users repeat. That is your 90/10 plan: 90% of your effort goes to answering those complaints helpfully in those two subreddits, 10% to everything else. PullPush gives you the historical base rate so you know whether a subreddit gets three relevant posts a day or three a month, which decides whether replying manually is worth your hours.
PullPush vs Manual Browsing vs Paid Reddit Tools
Where PullPush falls short
PullPush is a research archive, not a workflow. It finds historical posts and comments, but it won't monitor subreddits in real time, alert you when someone complains about a problem you solve, or draft replies that pass AutoMod. It also can't tell you why a post converted or track whether ChatGPT cites you. Once you've mapped where your users hang out, you still need something that acts on that map daily.
Honest comparison
Manual browsing gives you real-time context but costs hours, and Reddit's native search operators are weaker than PullPush's query syntax for digging into history. PullPush wins on free, deep research. Paid tools like Oetzi AI or Postiz handle ongoing posting and monitoring, which PullPush never attempts. The honest gap for our own product: HeyCatch covers planning and execution across channels, but if you only need raw historical Reddit data today, PullPush is free and does that one job better. Start there; upgrade when research becomes routine work.
Is PullPush Safe and Within Reddit's Rules?
PullPush only reads publicly available historical Reddit data, so searching and exporting it won't get your account banned. Reddit's rules bite when you act on that data: mass-DMing users you scraped is spam under Reddit's Self-Promotion policy and gets accounts suspended fast.
The safe workflow is research, then participate. Use PullPush to find the subreddits where your target users complain, then join those subs, follow each one's rules, and respect the 90/10 rule: 90% genuine contribution, 10% anything about your product. AutoMod bans self-promo in most subs, so lead with help, not links.
That's slower than cold outreach, but it's the version that survives.
FAQ
Is PullPush free to use, or does it need an API key?
PullPush is free. You open pullpush.io, pick Post or Comment, and search, with no account, key, or payment step. That is the point of the project: it replaced Pushshift's paid-access era with a community archive anyone can query. The trade-off is you get raw research, not monitoring or alerts.
Can I use PullPush to find users to DM about my product?
Don't. Mass-DMing people you scraped is spam under Reddit's Self-Promotion policy, and accounts get suspended fast. The safe workflow is research, then participate: find the subreddits where complaints cluster, join them, and lead with help rather than links. AutoMod in most subs bans self-promo anyway, so outreach fails on top of breaking rules.
Does PullPush work for subreddits that are private or banned?
Partly. PullPush indexes publicly available historical data, so posts and comments made before a subreddit went private or got banned often remain searchable. What it cannot show you is anything posted after the sub locked. Treat those results as a historical snapshot, and verify current subreddit status on Reddit before planning any engagement there.
How fresh is PullPush data compared to searching Reddit directly?
Reddit's native search sees the newest posts and comments immediately; PullPush usually doesn't, since archives lag live Reddit. But Reddit's search operators are weaker for digging into history, while PullPush handles date ranges, score filters, and author queries well. Use PullPush to map where complaints recur over months, and Reddit directly for this week.
Why is PullPush missing recent Reddit posts and comments?
PullPush is an archive, and archives lag live Reddit. Depending on indexing activity, the newest posts and comments can take time to appear, and coverage of very recent threads isn't guaranteed. If you need real-time conversations, search Reddit directly or browse the subreddit itself, then use PullPush for the historical record.