Comparison
webscrapingapi.dev vs ScraperAPI
ScraperAPI is a proxy-first scraping service: rotating residential IPs, CAPTCHA handling and geotargeting, sold by the credit. webscrapingapi.dev is a free, capped API without proxies. They overlap on "send a URL, get the page back", and differ on almost everything that costs money.
ScraperAPI's numbers were read from its pricing page in September 2026 and may have changed since. webscrapingapi.dev's numbers come from the same constants the API enforces.
In short
- ScraperAPI gets through sites that block bots. webscrapingapi.dev does not try; it tells you and refunds the credit.
- webscrapingapi.dev gives 50,000 credits a day for free; ScraperAPI's free plan is 1,000 credits a month and paid plans start at $49.
- Both return JSON for known sites. ScraperAPI covers big retail and search domains; webscrapingapi.dev covers a smaller list and builds new endpoints on request.
| Feature | webscrapingapi.dev | ScraperAPI |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free. 50,000 credits per account per day (about 1.5 million a month), no card, no plan to pick. | Free plan: 1,000 API credits a month with 5 concurrent connections. Paid from $49/month (100,000 credits) to $1,975/month (21.5 million); Enterprise is custom. A 7-day trial gives 5,000 credits. |
| What one credit buys | One plain fetch is 1 credit. A JavaScript render is 5, metadata 1, a site endpoint 1 (0 when the answer comes from the shared cache). | One basic request. Protected domains, premium proxies and JS rendering cost more credits per request; ScraperAPI publishes a per-domain cost guide. |
| Proxies and anti-bot | None. Requests come from Google Cloud IPs. A page that blocks the request returns SITE_BLOCKED and the credit is refunded. | Rotating residential and mobile proxies, CAPTCHA and anti-bot handling, automatic retries. This is the core of the product. |
| Geotargeting | No. | US and EU on Hobby and Startup; country-level on Business and above. |
| JavaScript rendering | Yes: headless Chrome, 5 credits, with an optional wait-for selector. | Yes, on every plan, at a higher credit cost per request. |
| Output formats | HTML, plain text, Markdown, or JSON from CSS extraction rules. A separate metadata endpoint returns title, Open Graph and JSON-LD. | HTML, plus JSON auto-parsing for supported domains through the Structured Data endpoints. |
| Ready-made JSON endpoints | 7 sites today: Amazon, YouTube, App Store, Google Play, Hacker News, Wikipedia, GitHub. New ones are built on request through the board. | Structured Data APIs for major retail and search domains such as Amazon, Google, Walmart and eBay. |
| Rate and concurrency | 60 requests a minute per key, up to 5 keys per account. | 5 concurrent threads on the free plan, 20 on Hobby, 500 or more on Enterprise. |
| Caching | Site endpoints keep results up to 30 days; a cached answer costs 0 credits and says how old it is. | Not part of the plans. |
| Crawling | No. One URL per request. | Full crawler access on all paid plans. |
| Reliability and support | One maintainer, no SLA. Questions and site requests go to the public board. | A 99.9% uptime guarantee; priority and dedicated support on the higher plans. |
Choose ScraperAPI when
- Your targets actively block bots and you need proxies, CAPTCHA handling or geotargeting.
- You need an uptime guarantee, support with a response time, and millions of requests a month.
- You want structured endpoints for Google, Walmart or eBay today.
Choose webscrapingapi.dev when
- You need pages as Markdown or JSON for an agent, a RAG pipeline or a prototype, and the sites do not fight back.
- You want it free, without a card, and 50,000 requests a day is more than enough.
- You want a JSON endpoint for one specific site and are happy to ask for it on the board.
Questions people ask
Is webscrapingapi.dev a drop-in replacement for ScraperAPI?
No. The request shape is similar (send a URL, get the page back), but there are no proxies, no CAPTCHA handling and no geotargeting. If your targets block plain requests, ScraperAPI is the right tool.
Why is webscrapingapi.dev free when ScraperAPI charges?
It is a capped service run by one person, without proxies, which are the expensive part. The daily cap and the shared cache keep the cost small. It may become paid later; that would be announced on the site first.
Are the site endpoints compatible with ScraperAPI’s structured data endpoints?
They follow the same idea, a path per site under /v1/structured, but parameters and response shapes are their own. Check the docs for each site before switching.
Something wrong or out of date here? Say so on the board and it gets fixed.