Getting the Facebook like/share count for a given URL

I'm using the Facebook API to get the like/share count for given URLs. The strange thing is that it seems to be quite inconsistent in returning results. For example, this page returns results:

https://api.facebook.com/method/fql.query?query=select%20total_count,like_count,comment_count,share_count,click_count%20from%20link_stat%20where%20url='http://www.groupon.com/deals/seattlehelitourscom-by-classic-helicopter-corp'&format=json

Whereas, this one does not:

https://api.facebook.com/method/fql.query?query=select%20total_count,like_count,comment_count,share_count,click_count%20from%20link_stat%20where%20url='http://www.livingsocial.com/deals/278194-sunset-kayaking-hot-chowder'&format=json

The second page clearly has a share count on it, and when I inspect the HTML of the page, the URL which is being used to share is the one I've placed into the API request above. However, the API does not respond with any count information for either number of likes or shares.

Any clues on why the API might be responding for some URLs but not for others?

Solution 1:

UPDATE: This solution is no longer valid. FQLs are deprecated since August 7th, 2016.

https://api.facebook.com/method/fql.query?query=select%20%20like_count%20from%20link_stat%20where%20url=%22http://www.techlila.com%22

Also http://api.facebook.com/restserver.php?method=links.getStats&urls=http://www.techlila.com will show you all the data like 'Share Count', 'Like Count' and 'Comment Count' and total of all these.

Change the URL (i.e. http://www.techlila.com) as per your need.

This is the correct URL, I'm getting right results.

EDIT (May 2017): as of v2.9 you can make a graph API call where ID is the URL and select the 'engagement' field, below is a link with the example from the graph explorer.

https://developers.facebook.com/tools/explorer/?method=GET&path=%3Fid%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Fcomunidade.edp.pt%26fields%3Dengagement&version=v2.9

Solution 2:

As of August 8th, 2016, FQLs are deprecated.

Update 10/2017 (v2.10):

Here's a non-deprecated way to get a given URL's like and share count (no access token required):

https://graph.facebook.com/?fields=og_object{likes.summary(total_count).limit(0)},share&id=https://www.stackoverflow.com

Result:

{
   "og_object": {
      "likes": {
         "data": [

         ],
         "summary": {
            "total_count": 83
         }
      },
      "id": "10151023731873397"
   },
   "share": {
      "comment_count": 0,
      "share_count": 2915
   },
   "id": "https://www.stackoverflow.com"
}

JQuery Example:

$.get('https://graph.facebook.com/'
    + '?fields=og_object{likes.summary(total_count).limit(0)},share&id='
    + url-goes-here,
    function (data) {
        if (data) {
            var like_count = data.og_object.likes.summary.total_count;
            var share_count = data.share.share_count;
        }
    });

Reference:

https://developers.facebook.com/docs/graph-api/reference/url