ScrapingBee alternative: Web Scraper vs ScrapingBee
ScrapingBee is an API that fetches pages through a headless browser and rotating proxies and hands back HTML, screenshots, or extracted output, billed in credits that vary by request type. Web Scraper Cloud returns named fields from selectors you define visually, with rendering and datacenter proxies included in a capacity-priced plan.
Reviewed October 2026 Every claim below links to a current vendor page.
You want structured rows on a schedule and a fee that does not change when a target needs rendering or a better proxy.
You are calling an endpoint from your own code and want per-request control over rendering, proxies, and screenshots.
Web Scraper vs ScrapingBee: features and pricing
Compare how Web Scraper and ScrapingBee handle setup, Cloud automation, integrations, proxies, and scaling. Web Scraper Scale is compared with ScrapingBee Business+, the highest self-service plan each vendor prices publicly.
| CAPABILITY | Web Scraper Scale, $200 per month | ScrapingBee Business+, $599 per month |
|---|---|---|
| Setup and creation | ||
| Where scrapers are built | Visual sitemap builder in a browser extension Free extension for Chrome, Firefox, and Edge, with no code or desktop application required. | API calls You send a URL and handle the response in your own code. |
| Time to a working scraper | Faster than writing code Point at the data on the live page, or let the AI Sitemap Wizard map it, then check the result in the data preview. | Code to write and test Requests and parsing, or extract rules, are written and debugged in your own code. |
| Skills needed | Browser skills No programming language or HTML parsing to learn. | Programming A programming language, HTTP requests, and CSS selectors or HTML parsing. |
| AI-assisted setup | AI Sitemap Wizard Maps repeated listing data, detects pagination and infinite scrolling, and follows item links to collect fields from detail pages. | AI extraction parameters ai_query and ai_extract_rules return prompt-based or schema-based output from a request. |
| Manual selector control | Advanced Sitemap Builder Point and click, AI selector generation for listing and detail pages, and 10+ selector types for data, navigation, and clicks. | Your own parser or extract rules Return raw HTML and parse it yourself, or pass extract rules with the request. |
| Logins and site setup | Website State Setup Signs in or sets location, language, or currency before scraping, only when that state is missing, with passwords encrypted in Cloud. | No logged-in scraping ScrapingBee's policy forbids scraping behind a login; cookies and click or fill steps can set other page state per request. |
| Ready-made starting points | Sitemap Marketplace Ready-made sitemaps maintained by Web Scraper, available at no additional cost. | Dedicated endpoints Google, Amazon, Walmart, YouTube, and Shopee endpoints return structured output without your own parser. |
| When a website changes | Update a selector Fix the sitemap by point and click and sync it to Cloud, with nothing to redeploy. | Patch your code Selector and parsing changes go through your own code and deployment. |
| Cloud automation | ||
| Cloud execution | Web Scraper Cloud Runs sitemaps created in the Web Scraper extension remotely after sync or import. | Hosted API Requests execute on ScrapingBee infrastructure. |
| Queue, link following, and storage | Built into every job Cloud queues URLs, follows links and pagination, retries failed pages, and keeps results for 60 days. | Local CLI or your own code The ScrapingBee CLI batches URL lists, follows links, and saves results on your own machine; the API returns one page per request. |
| Scheduling | Daily, interval, and custom CRON Intervals as short as 1 minute, with a selectable time zone and driver, proxy, and priority set per schedule. | Local schedules through the CLI The CLI can schedule jobs on your own machine; nothing is scheduled in ScrapingBee's cloud. |
| Rendering and execution modes | Full JS and Fast drivers Full JS loads pages in a full browser environment; Fast skips page JavaScript to scrape faster. | JavaScript rendering flag A browser request costs five credits against one for plain HTTP, and Auto-Mode picks the cheapest setting that works. |
| Retry behavior | Automatic retries of empty or failed pages Retries use a different proxy IP and browser fingerprint, and do not consume URL credits. CAPTCHAs and bot check pages are solved automatically. | Retries on another proxy Failed scrapes are retried on another proxy and not charged, but 404, 410, and 413 responses are billed. |
| Concurrency model | Concurrent scrapers Starts at 2 concurrent scrapers and scales with no set ceiling; add capacity at any time. A single job can expand to up to 5 concurrent scrapers. | 400 concurrent requests The number of requests that can run at once. |
| Data and integrations | ||
| Data cleaning | Parser, with no code Regex, replace, HTML stripping, virtual columns, and timestamp conversion, previewed on sample records and applied in Cloud. | Whitespace trimming Extraction rules trim spaces and line breaks, and AI extraction shapes values for 5 extra credits; other changes need your own code. |
| Data quality checks | Thresholds on every job Minimum records, maximum failed or empty pages, and minimum filled fields, with suggested values from a previous run. | Not built in Checks on result counts or empty fields need your own code. |
| API | Cloud API with an OpenAPI description Manage sitemaps, jobs, and schedules, and download results, with code examples for every programming language. | HTML API and dedicated endpoints Each request returns its result directly, so there are no jobs to manage. |
| Webhooks | Job status webhooks Sent when a job finishes, stops, or fails, with job and sitemap IDs and an optional custom ID, and retried if your endpoint does not respond. | None Requests return results directly; no webhooks are documented. |
| Data export formats | CSV, XLSX, JSON Each scraping job's data can be downloaded in all three formats. | HTML, JSON, Markdown Plain text is also available, and the CLI can save batch results as CSV or NDJSON. |
| Export integrations | Google Sheets, Google Drive, Dropbox, S3, Google Cloud, Azure The complete dataset is sent after each job finishes. | Make, n8n, Zapier Official apps for automation platforms; no storage destinations are documented. |
| Notifications | Email and in-app alerts Alerts when a job fails or misses its data quality thresholds, with email and in-app channels set per alert type. | None No alerts are documented. |
| Image and file handling | Image export Downloads images during the scraping job using the Image selector and delivers the files to Amazon S3, Google Cloud Storage, or Azure Blob Storage. | Files by URL and screenshots Images, PDFs, and other files are returned one URL per request up to 2 MB, and screenshots can capture the page or one element; nothing is delivered to storage. |
| Scale and pricing | ||
| Plan compared | Scale, $200 per month $2,000 per year billed annually, $167 per month. | Business+, $599 per month Highest self-service tier. |
| What the plan fee buys | Unlimited URL credits The fee buys concurrent scraping capacity, and page volume does not change it. | 8,000,000 API credits An HTTP request costs one credit, JavaScript rendering five, and premium proxies ten or more. |
| Cost per 1,000 URLs no JS, DC proxies | From $0.03 Fast driver on the included datacenter proxies; two scrapers at $200 per month cover about 4.3M URLs. | $0.075 One credit per request with JavaScript turned off on the classic proxy. |
| Cost per 1,000 URLs JS, DC proxies | From $0.05 Full JS driver on the included datacenter proxies; two scrapers at $200 per month cover about 2.2M URLs. | $0.37 Five credits per request with JavaScript on, the default. |
| Cost per 1,000 URLs JS, Residential proxies | From $0.681 Full JS driver plus residential traffic, sold separately at $2.50 per GB. | $1.87 Premium proxies with JavaScript cost 25 credits per request, and stealth proxies 75. |
| Unused capacity | No credit ceiling Unlimited URL credits leave no balance to forfeit at the end of a cycle. | Credits do not roll over The balance resets at the billing cycle. |
| Included datacenter proxies | US, GB, and DE datacenter proxies Included at no additional cost. | Included in the credit cost Proxy class is a request option rather than a separate line. |
| Residential proxies | Available at $2.50 per GB In 47 locations, billed on bandwidth used. | Premium and stealth options Harder targets consume several credits per request. |
| Third-party fees | Marketplace sitemaps at no extra cost They run on your own plan, with no separate per-result charge. | None published No marketplace or per-result fees. |
| Cloud data retention | 60 days Scraped data stays available to download from Cloud for that period. | Not confirmed in public docs No retention period is published; results are returned per request. |
1 Proxy traffic is sold separately, so the price is calculated based on a 250 KB page size.
Reasons to choose Web Scraper
No parser to write or maintain
Selectors are defined visually on the live page, or generated by the AI Sitemap Wizard, and return named columns, so nothing downstream has to turn HTML into a table.
Web Scraper extensionScheduling and delivery are built in
Daily, interval, and custom CRON schedules run in Cloud, the finished dataset goes to Google Sheets, Google Drive, Dropbox, S3, Google Cloud, or Azure, and webhooks report when each job ends.
SchedulerOne plan, one line item
Scraping, scheduling, datacenter proxies, parsing, and delivery sit inside the Cloud plan, with no separate proxy bill, no per-request multiplier, and no charge for retrying failed pages.
Web Scraper pricingWeb Scraper Scale vs ScrapingBee Business+
Each side is shown at its highest self-service plan with published pricing.
Web Scraper Cloud · Scale
$200 per month
Or $2,000 per year billed annually, $167 per month
- Capacity
- Unlimited URL credits
- Concurrency
- Starts at 2 concurrent scrapers, scales with no set ceiling; a single job can use up to 5
- Proxies
- US, GB, and DE datacenter proxies included; residential in 47 locations at $2.50 per GB
- Plan limitation
- Capacity grows by adding concurrent scrapers, at a lower price per scraper as you add more; residential proxy traffic is billed on usage
- Cost per 1,000 URLs no JS, DC proxies
- From $0.03
- Cost per 1,000 URLs JS, DC proxies
- From $0.05
- Cost per 1,000 URLs JS, Residential proxies
- From $0.681
ScrapingBee · Business+
$599 per month
Highest self-service tier, billed monthly.
- Capacity
- 8,000,000 API credits
- Concurrency
- 400 concurrent requests
- Proxies
- Included in the credit cost; premium requests consume more
- Plan limitation
- JavaScript rendering costs five credits and premium proxies ten or more; 404 and 410 responses are billable and credits do not roll over
- Cost per 1,000 URLs no JS, DC proxies
- $0.075
- Cost per 1,000 URLs JS, DC proxies
- $0.37
- Cost per 1,000 URLs JS, Residential proxies
- $1.87
The two prices do not buy the same unit
A ScrapingBee credit covers one plain HTTP request, but a browser request costs five and premium or stealth proxies cost more, so the effective rate depends on the target. Web Scraper charges for concurrent scraping capacity, with unlimited URL credits whichever driver runs.
- The ScrapingBee figures count one credit without JavaScript, five with it, and 25 with JavaScript on premium proxies.
- ScrapingBee returns page content, so parser development and maintenance are not counted in either figure.
- 1 Proxy traffic is sold separately, so the price is calculated based on a 250 KB page size.
ScrapingBee suits code that sets rendering, proxy class, and screenshots on each request.
Switching from ScrapingBee
Do we still need a parser?
No. A sitemap defines the fields, so Cloud returns named columns rather than page content for your code to interpret.
How does the bill change?
A credit pool that charges more for rendering and premium proxies is replaced by a fixed capacity plan. The fee buys concurrent scrapers with unlimited URL credits.
Does rendering cost extra?
No. The Full JS driver and the Fast driver both consume one URL credit per page load; only the throughput differs.
How does data reach our systems?
Results are retrieved through the API or delivered to Google Sheets, Google Drive, Dropbox, Amazon S3, Google Cloud, or Microsoft Azure after each job. Webhook notifications report job status and identifiers.
See it applied to your use case
Compare Web Scraper with other tools
Most teams shortlist two or three tools. These pages cover the same capabilities and plan tiers.
Try it on the website you want to scrape
Use the 7-day free trial, with no credit card required, to run Web Scraper Cloud on the website you need data from.
This comparison reflects publicly available information and our understanding of the products as of October 2026. Features, pricing, and other details may change over time, so we recommend verifying current information directly with each provider before making a decision. All product names, trademarks, logos, and brands belong to their respective owners and are referenced solely for identification and comparison purposes. No affiliation, sponsorship, or endorsement is implied.