UltraWebScrapingAPI vs ScraperAPI
ScraperAPI is affordable for basic scraping.
On advanced anti-bot sites, it doesn't work at all.
The Short Version
ScraperAPI is a great budget option for sites with basic or no anti-bot protection. But their "anti-bot" mode is just proxy rotation with headless Chrome — it fails completely on Akamai Bot Manager, DataDome, Kasada, and PerimeterX. If those are your targets, you need UltraWebScrapingAPI.
Anti-Bot Success Rate Comparison
| Anti-Bot System | UltraWebScrapingAPI | ScraperAPI |
|---|---|---|
| Akamai Bot Manager | 99%+ | Fails |
| Cloudflare Turnstile | 99%+ | ~65% |
| DataDome | 99%+ | Fails |
| PerimeterX (HUMAN) | 99%+ | Fails |
| Kasada | 99%+ | Fails |
| Basic Cloudflare | 99%+ | 95%+ |
| No protection | 99%+ | 99%+ |
Pricing: Cheap Isn't Cheap When It Fails
ScraperAPI advertises low per-request pricing. But their "premium" anti-bot credits cost 10-25x more, and still fail on advanced protection. The cheapest service is the one that returns data.
| Metric | UltraWebScrapingAPI | ScraperAPI |
|---|---|---|
| Price per request | $0.05 | $0.005 (basic) / $0.05-$0.125 (premium) |
| Anti-bot success rate | 99.9% | 0-5% on Akamai/DataDome |
| Effective cost / successful page | ~$0.05 | N/A (fails on hard sites) |
| Pricing model | Pay-as-you-go, $20 min | Monthly subscription ($49/mo+) |
| Credits expire? | Never | Monthly reset |
Why ScraperAPI Fails on Anti-Bot Sites
Proxy rotation doesn't defeat fingerprinting
ScraperAPI rotates IP addresses. Akamai, DataDome, and PerimeterX don't block by IP — they fingerprint the browser engine, canvas rendering, and JavaScript environment. New IP, same fingerprint, same block.
Headless Chrome is instantly detected
ScraperAPI's "render" mode uses headless Chrome. Modern anti-bot systems detect headless browsers through dozens of signals: navigator.webdriver, missing plugins, canvas anomalies, and more.
No per-site analysis
Every Akamai deployment is configured differently. ScraperAPI uses the same generic approach for every site. We reverse-engineer each target's specific anti-bot configuration.
Where ScraperAPI Wins
- Budget scraping — $49/mo for 100K requests on basic sites is great value
- Simple integration — Add API key to URL, get HTML back. Very developer-friendly
- Basic Cloudflare — Handles standard Cloudflare challenges well
- SERP scraping — Google, Bing, Amazon search results at scale
When to Use Each
Use ScraperAPI when:
- Target sites have no anti-bot or basic Cloudflare only
- You need high volume on easy sites at low cost
- You're scraping search engine results
Use UltraWebScrapingAPI when:
- Target sites use Akamai, DataDome, Kasada, PerimeterX, or Imperva
- ScraperAPI returns 403s, empty HTML, or CAPTCHA pages
- You need 99%+ success rate on protected sites
- You want pay-as-you-go with no monthly commitment
Related Resources
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