Top 20 Web Crawling Tools to Extract Data from Websites in 2023

Justin Shin

Are you trying to find the best tools for web crawling? I have assembled for you the top web crawling tools in the market right now for you to choose from. Read the article below to discover them now, This definitive guide covers the top 20 web crawling tools available today. Compare popular crawlers like Apache Nutch, Octoparse, Apify, and more based on pricing, platform, key features and more. Find the best tool to extract data from websites.

The internet contains a treasure trove of data that can provide invaluable insights for businesses, researchers, and developers. However, manually extracting this data from websites is tedious and time-consuming. This is where web crawling tools come in. Web crawlers automate the process of systematically browsing the internet and scraping data from websites.

In this comprehensive guide, we cover the top 20 web crawling tools available in 2023. We compare popular tools like Apache Nutch, Octoparse, Apify, Mozenda, UiPath, and more. You'll find options suited for developers building custom crawlers as well as easy-to-use tools for non-technical users.

Table Of Contents

Overview of Top Web Crawling Tools

Top 20 Web Crawling Tools Compared (2023)

Key factors provided in the comparison include:

Whether you need to track prices, conduct research, monitor websites, or extract large datasets - this guide will help you find the ideal web crawling solution. Dive in to discover the diverse capabilities of tools like ScraperAPI, Octoparse, Mozenda, and more. Automate data extraction and supercharge your workflow with the top web crawlers available today!

Tool Pricing Platform Key Features
Apache Nutch Free Desktop Open source, customizable, supports plugins
80legs Starts at $29/month Cloud Scalable, API integration, advanced filtering
Octoparse Starts at $75/month Cloud, Desktop Easy to use, schedules crawls automatically
Apify Starts at $49/month API For developers, scalable, integrates with cloud platforms
Helium Scraper $99 one-time Desktop Visual interface, dynamic content scraping
WebHarvy Starts at $139 Desktop Point-and-click, schedules crawls, data export options
ScraperAPI Starts at $49/month API Handles proxies, CAPTCHAs, rendering, scalable
Scrapy Free SDK For Python, flexible, handles cookies/sessions
StormCrawler Free SDK Low latency, for custom crawler development
HTTrack Free Desktop Creates offline browseable website copy
Scrape.it Starts at $99/month Cloud For Node.js, rate limiting, error handling
ParseHub Free/paid plans Cloud, Desktop Schedules crawls, exports data formats
Import.io Custom pricing Cloud Point-and-click, no coding required
Mozenda Custom pricing Cloud Enterprise-level, security, scalable
Sequentum Starts at $15K/month Cloud Alternative to Mozenda, data transformation
Nokogiri Free SDK For Ruby developers, parsing HTML/XML
UiPath Free/paid plans Cloud, Desktop Advanced features, scalable
Spinn3r Custom pricing Cloud Powerful crawler, spam blocking
Zyte Starts at $60/month API Affordable, flexible plans, quick setup

In the vast and dynamic Internet, where information is supreme, web crawling technologies are the unsung heroes that probe into the depths of the Internet. Collecting all of the data you need to make all of your business and developmental decisions. These tools could offer a lot of knowledge and prospects, whether you're an aspiring data scientist, a curious marketer, or just a tech enthusiast.

Today, let's take a tour of the top web crawling programs that have completely changed how we gather and analyze data from the internet. This list highlights the greatest of the best, each having their own special combination of qualities and skills, from the tried-and-true veterans to the cutting-edge newcomers.

Imagine a world in which you could easily use these powerful crawlers to gather information for market research, keep track of competitor prices, extract social media trends, and scrape data from websites. Below are the top 20 web crawling tools in the market for you.

1. Apache Nutch – Overall Best Web Crawling Tool

Apache Nutch is a crawling tool that is amazing and stands out for its top-notch capabilities. It can explore and gather information from the internet systematically because of its strong web crawling skills. Apache is very scalable and effective for large-scale web crawling activities since it supports distributed crawling. Additionally, it offers numerous configuration options that allow customers to adapt the crawling process to their unique requirements.

Furthermore, Apache has sophisticated URL filtering and duplicate detection tools to guarantee precise and targeted data extraction. Apache permits the introduction of plugins for increased functionality because of its extensible architecture.

Additionally, it is suitable for a variety of online settings because of its support for numerous protocols and file formats. Last but not least, Apache excels as a crawling tool, enabling users to precisely and easily retrieve online data.

2. 80legs — Highly Customizable Web Crawling Tool

A user-friendly web crawler with impressive customization features is 80legs. Its adaptability gives customers the ability to customize their crawling experience to meet their demands exactly. 80legs have you covered whether you're a researcher, data analyst, or business professional. Its user interface is simple to use, making it simple to set up data extraction rules, establish crawl parameters, and control the entire operation.

The robust scalability of 80legs is one of its distinguishing qualities. It can process enormous volumes of data and simultaneously crawl thousands of websites, delivering quick results. Additionally, the tool supports JavaScript rendering, which makes it simple to extract data from dynamic websites.

In addition, 80legs provides significant API compatibility, enabling smooth connection with current platforms or programmes. In addition, 80legs offers sophisticated filtering features that let customers tailor their crawls according to particular standards like domain, language, or content type.

3. Octoparse — Best Web Crawler for Everyday Professionals

Octoparse is a web crawling tool that completely changes the game. It is one of the best web crawlers out there, thanks to its remarkable features. Its user-friendly interface makes it simple to get around in the complicated realm of data extraction. Octoparse supports dynamic webpages with ease, handling JavaScript, AJAX, and even logins. It does away with the requirement for coding expertise by providing a robust point-and-click interface.

The needed data is readily identified and extracted thanks to its intelligent data recognition capacity, saving hours of manual labor. Even during major projects, Octoparse's cloud-based infrastructure ensures continual scraping. You can automate scraping with the built-in scheduler, which makes it an essential tool for time-sensitive activities.

Octoparse makes data export and analysis simpler through its seamless interface with well-known databases and APIs. In summary, Octoparse dominates the competition and makes web crawling a fun and effective experience.

4. Apify — Best Web Crawler for Developers

Apify is a superb web crawling tool with a number of web scrapers and crawlers for your everyday website and tasks. You can see Apify as a web crawling platform with a collection of web scrapers known as actors. It makes the process of getting data from websites simpler with its simple interface and broad capability. Its adaptability is one of its primary advantages.

Apify allows you to easily scrape data from even the most complex websites because it supports both static and dynamic web pages. Because of its strong architecture, you can do efficient and scalable crawling, which lets you manage complicated projects with ease. While non-coders can make use of this service, it is meant for coders, most notably NodeJS and Python developers.

There is an SDK for these developers to use in other to access the service and its actors. Additionally, Apify offers a faster workflow because of its seamless integration with well-known products and platforms like AWS, Google Cloud, and Zapier.

5. Helium Scraper — Best Visual Web Crawling Tool

Would you like a visual web crawler? The outstanding visual web crawling application Helium Scraper makes it easier to gather data from websites. Its intuitive interface, like those of Octoparse and Apify, enables even non-technical users to browse and take advantage of its potent features easily. By merely interacting with online sites, the tool enables you to visually develop scraping agents, doing away with the necessity for intricate coding.

So you can extract dynamic content, it supports sophisticated scraping techniques, including pagination, form filling, and JavaScript execution. Additionally, it provides flexible options for data extraction, including text, photos, tables, and more, providing you with the freedom to compile the data you require.

For additional examination, the retrieved data can be exported in a variety of formats, including CSV, Excel, and databases. For visual web crawling and data extraction, Helium Scraper stands out as a top option thanks to its speed, adaptability, and user-friendly interface.

6. WebHarvy — Excellent Point-and-Click Web Crawler

The process of obtaining data from websites is made simpler by the innovative point-and-click web crawling application known as WebHarvy. You can quickly scrape text, pictures, URLs, and even structured data like tables and lists with WebHarvy. The capacity to identify patterns intelligently is what distinguishes WebHarvy. It may retrieve pertinent data automatically based on repeated patterns found on a webpage, saving you precious time.

Additionally, WebHarvy allows for the execution of JavaScript, making it effective for managing dynamic websites. Without any coding experience, you can easily navigate and retrieve data from web pages thanks to its user-friendly interface.

The collected data may be exported in a variety of forms, such as CSV, Excel, or databases, making it easy to integrate with the tools you like to use for data analysis. WebHarvy guarantees that your data extraction operations may be completed successfully and frequently thanks to its powerful scheduling and automation tools.

7. ScraperAPI — Best Alternative for Apify

Scraper API is a web scraping API. Let me explain ScraperAPI to you. If you need an alternative to the Apify crawling tool, this one is excellent. To start, using ScraperAPI couldn't be simpler. You may extract data from websites using its straightforward API without having to build up and maintain your own infrastructure, which saves time.

Additionally, it takes care of all the challenging aspects of web scraping, such as providing and managing proxies, solving CAPTCHAs, and rendering JavaScript, for you. No matter how dynamic or secure a website is, you may easily scrape its data with ScraperAPI. But ScraperAPI's scalability is what makes it unique.

Even for massive projects, its highly distributed architecture assures quick and dependable scraping. By sending concurrent requests, you can quickly grow your crawling operations, and ScraperAPI will take care of load balancing.

8. Scrapy — Free Python Web Crawler  

With the help of the free and open-source Python web crawling technology known as Scrapy, developers can easily extract data from websites. With its flexibility and strength, Scrapy makes it easier to navigate complicated websites and gather structured data quickly. Large-scale scraping projects benefit greatly from its outstanding features, which include a sturdy architecture that enables scalability and parallel processing.

Additionally, Scrapy provides a wide range of tools and modules that let developers manage a variety of online scraping tasks, including handling cookies, controlling sessions, and browsing through paginated information. Developers can adapt their scraping workflows because of its versatile and extensible design, which enables modification and integration of middleware, pipelines, and spider middleware.

In order to facilitate effective and dependable online scraping, Scrapy also includes built-in functionality for handling typical tasks like handling errors, prioritizing requests, and following links.

9. StormCrawler — Best SDK for Low-Latency Web Crawlers

StormCrawler is not your regular web crawler. It can be likened to Scrapy since it is an SDK for developing highly scalable web crawlers. If you need to develop a low-latency web crawler, then StormCrawler is the tool for you. With this SDK, you can develop a web crawler for crawling and indexing websites. The features you include are up to you – but you are provided the tool here.

This crawling tool is free to use. It is built on Apache Storm, and this is where it got its name from. It is actually built on the Java programming language and gives you the freedom to how you want to make use of it.

StormCrawler is used for a good number of use cases, some of which include web exploratory study and graph analysis, security information retrieval and extraction. From all of what I have written, I expect you to know thagt you need to be a coder before you know how to make use of this.

10. HTTRack Website Copier — Best for Downloading Website for Offline Usage

Last on the list is the HTTrack website copier. This web crawling tool is quite specialized in what it does. with this tool, you can convert a website into an offline browsable site. It does this by crawling your website of choice, downloading all of the pages on it, and converting the online URLs into local URLs so that you can access the site offline. It is not only good for keeping an offline version of your website, but it is also good for those with poor Internet.

However, it is important you know that with this, you always have the historical version of a website, as it will not tell you when the site has been modified. One good thing you will come to like about this specialized web crawling tool is that it is free to use without requiring you to pay a dime. It is available as a desktop application for both Windows and Linux. Currently, macOS is not supported.

11. Scrape.it — Best Web Crawling Tool for Node.js

The greatest web crawling tool designed just for Node.js, Scrape.it, is full of strong capabilities. It is a preferred option for developers thanks to its user-friendly interface and thorough documentation. Its main advantage is its powerful crawling skills, which let you easily collect data from websites. Complex web scraping operations are made possible by the smooth JavaScript integration of Scrape.it.

By utilizing CSS selectors and XPath expressions, its sophisticated selection engine enables accurate data extraction. The solution also provides effective rate limitation and request throttling techniques to ensure you adhere to moral and legal bounds.

Additionally, it has thorough error handling and retry capabilities, ensuring dependable and durable web scraping activities. To easily scrape and parse HTML, XML, JSON, and other web data types, use Scrape.it. This makes it a fantastic option for Node.js developers looking for a robust and adaptable web crawling solution.

12. ParseHub — Best Web Crawler for Schedule Crawling  

ParseHub is a perfect scheduled web crawling tool that takes the hassle out of data extraction. Using its user-friendly interface and powerful capabilities, it empowers users to effortlessly scrape websites on a regular basis. Its scheduling feature allows you to automate the crawling process, ensuring that data is collected at specific intervals without manual intervention.

ParseHub's advanced extraction rules enable you to precisely extract the data you need, whether it's text, images, or even complex structures. It also supports JavaScript rendering, making it capable of handling dynamic websites.

To make it simple to integrate the data into your processes, it can be exported in a number of formats, including CSV, Excel, and JSON. ParseHub is a go-to tool for trustworthy and effective online scraping, whether you're a business professional, researcher, or data enthusiast. Get rid of the problem of missing temporal data by using ParseHub.

13. Import.io — Best Web Crawling Tool for Non-Coders

Do you think that coding is a barrier to web crawling? Here is a web crawler that doesn't require any coding knowledge. Import.io is a fantastic web crawling tool that is ideal for non-coders that want to quickly extract data from websites. Any website may be converted into structured data without a single line of code being written. merely because Import.io has a strong point-and-click interface, allowing you to precisely pick the data you wish to extract.

Even from complicated web pages, its sophisticated extraction algorithms guarantee accurate and trustworthy results. Like ParseHub, the tool also offers automated scheduling. Thus, enabling you to collect information at regular periods.

It is simple to incorporate the extracted data into your favorite programmes or systems because Import.io enables data export in a number of formats, including CSV, Excel, and JSON. Import.io is a crucial tool for non-technical users, whether you need to track prices, gather market intelligence, or carry out research.

14. Mozenda — Excellent Cloud-Based Web Crawling Tool for Enterprises

A web crawling solution for businesses looking for thorough data extraction is called Mozenda. It makes obtaining massive amounts of data from websites easier because of its cutting-edge capabilities. Its cloud-based storage is the reason for this. Mozenda's user-friendly interface makes it simple to configure and customize web scraping activities.

A timely and automated data extraction process is made possible by its strong scheduling capabilities, ensuring current insights. Intelligent data collection algorithms from Mozenda explore complicated websites while navigating around obstacles like JavaScript rendering and CAPTCHA security.

The tool supports easy integration with current systems by offering a wide variety of output options, including CSV, Excel, and databases. Mozenda is a trustworthy and scalable option for businesses looking to quickly and easily extract useful data from the web thanks to its strong security features and enterprise-level support. In conclusion, it provides businesses with a superb data-crawling solution.

15. Sequentum - Best Alternative for Mozenda

A great Mozenda substitute is the fantastic web-crawling application Sequentum. Users may easily and precisely extract data from websites because of their excellent capabilities. Even non-technical people can easily develop sophisticated crawling projects because of its user-friendly interface. To ensure access to secured content, Sequentum supports a number of authentication techniques, such as login credentials and session handling.

Its capability to manage dynamic websites, especially those made using JavaScript and AJAX, is one of its distinguishing characteristics. It provides customers with versatile data extraction choices, including text, HTML, photos, and files, enabling them to compile thorough information.

Users of Sequentum can automate and schedule scraping operations to run at predetermined intervals.  Additionally, it offers sophisticated data transformation features that let users effectively edit and clean extracted data.

16. Nokogiri — Excellent Web Crawler for Ruby

Nokogiri is a superb web crawling library for developed for the Ruby programming language. It is for quickly processing XML and HTML files. Its abundance of features makes it a preferred option for developers. Nokogiri can easily travel through complex document structures, extract data, and change information thanks to its strong parsing capabilities. In order to facilitate effective querying and searching, it supports XPath and CSS selectors.

The reliability of the extracted data is ensured by Nokogiri's comprehensive error management and validation features. It also has outstanding memory efficiency and performance, making it appropriate for managing complex scraping operations.

Its vast documentation and vibrant community add to its attractiveness and offer a wealth of tools for learning and troubleshooting. With its many functionalities, Nokogiri truly empowers developers and makes web crawling easy. It is crucial to note that coding expertise makes one more adept at using this tool.

17. UiPath — Premium Web Crawler

A high-end web crawling tool with a variety of potent capabilities, UiPath stands out. Its user-friendly interface makes it simple for users to extract data from websites. The sophisticated scraping features of UiPath enable the precise extraction of both organized and unstructured data, including text, photos, and tables. Its powerful automation engine guarantees efficient and dependable crawling processes, producing trustworthy results.

UiPath also provides many customization possibilities, enabling users to adapt their web scraping workflows to suit their needs. It integrates with well-known databases, supports a variety of data types, and integrates seamlessly with other tools and technologies. The great scalability of UiPath makes it simple to manage complicated web scraping applications.

Additionally, it offers extensive recording and monitoring features, ensuring visibility and control over the crawling procedure. As a last point, UiPath is a top-tier, high-end web crawling tool that gives users access to a wide range of features and streamlines their ability to extract useful data from the web.

18. Spinn3r — Web Crawler with Spam Protection

Spinn3r is an effective web crawling tool with a strong anti-spam feature. It searches the vastness of the internet, indexing and gathering information from many sources. Websites for news, blogs, and social media are examples of this. By removing spam and unnecessary content with the help of its sophisticated algorithms, Spinn3r makes sure the data it obtains is real and of high quality.

The spam prevention function of Spinn3r uses sophisticated methods to recognise and eliminate harmful or deceptive material, preventing it from contaminating the data pool. By doing this, it improves the dependability and quality of the data that is gathered, allowing users to make defensible conclusions.

Spinn3r is a useful tool for companies, researchers, and developers looking for thorough and accurate web data without the noise and deceit that spam frequently delivers because of its combination of powerful web crawling skills and spam prevention function.

19. Zyte (Scrapinghub) — All-encompassing Data Collection Tool

Zyte is a fantastic cloud-based web crawling solution that is affordable and ideal for all of your data extraction needs. It has a bevy of wonderful features that make web scraping simple. You can rapidly start-up and customize your scraping tasks with ease thanks to its user-friendly UI. Zyte's strong infrastructure guarantees quick and effective crawling, enabling you to quickly collect massive amounts of data.

Additionally, it has intelligent data extraction features that make it simple to retrieve particular data from web pages. Zyte stands out due to its accessibility to organizations of all sizes because of its low cost.

There are several adjustable pricing options available to fit your goals and budget. Therefore, Zyte is the best option for economical, cloud-based web crawling, whether you're a small startup or a major corporation.

FAQs

Q. How Do I Choose the Right Web Crawling Tool for My Needs?

Making a good choice of a web crawler is dependent on many factors. Sometimes, the type of data you want to harvest or the structure of the website might determine such.

Thus, consider aspects like your unique requirements, the difficulty of the websites you want to crawl, your level of technical expertise, and your budget when selecting the best web crawling tool. Consider each tool's capabilities, usability, scalability, and support options. To make a well-informed choice, compare the effectiveness and dependability of the tools and read reviews.

The legality of web crawling technologies relies on their use; web crawling itself is not unlawful. Respecting website terms of service, following robots.txt instructions, and abiding by any laws or rules governing data scraping in your jurisdiction is essential.

Review the terms and conditions of the websites you intend to crawl to make sure you are collecting data lawfully and with permission. Simply put, the use of the crawling tools is not on its own illegal but the manner of use may render them illegal.

Q. Can Web Crawling Tools Handle Websites with Complex Structures and Dynamic Content?

Yes, a lot of web crawling programmes are made to handle dynamically generated, complex websites. Advanced functionality is available for dealing with JavaScript-heavy websites, handling login authentication, and processing AJAX queries.

Also, browsing across dynamic information in tools like Scrapy, Selenium, and Apify is taken care of. These technologies offer adaptability and modification possibilities to accommodate different website structures and efficiently collect data.

Conclusion

The remarkable strength and adaptability of the top 20 web crawling tools leave us in amazement as we come to a close on our exploration into the world of web crawling. These tools, which range from Scrapy's unwavering efficiency to Apify's unrivaled precision, have unlocked a wealth of knowledge and revolutionized the way we gather and analyze data. Whether you're an inquisitive researcher, an ambitious marketer, or a data-driven businessperson, these web crawling tools will be your dependable allies in your quest for knowledge. So embrace the crawling revolution, get out on your data-driven excursions, and discover the virtually limitless opportunities that are waiting for you there.

The internet contains a treasure trove of data that can provide invaluable insights for businesses, researchers, and developers. However, manually extracting this data from websites is tedious and time-consuming. This is where web crawling tools come in. Web crawlers automate the process of systematically browsing the internet and scraping data from websites. However, in order for web-crawling tools to work properly, you need an internet connection that works seamlessly, such as the likes of Spectrum Internet and its reliable service.

Cheers to crawling!

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