SCRAPFLY ALTERNATIVE

The ScrapFly alternative with a simpler credit model

ScrapFly earns its reputation on anti-bot bypass and excellent docs. WebScraping.AI offers the same core job — rendered pages through datacenter, residential, or stealth proxies plus AI extraction — with flatter, cheaper credit math and 7 official SDKs.

2,000 free API credits · No credit card required

Abstract illustration comparing WebScraping.AI and ScrapFly

WebScraping.AI vs ScrapFly at a glance

An honest, side-by-side comparison. Verify the numbers — this is a market where you should.

WebScraping.AI ScrapFly
Entry plan $29/mo · 250,000 credits $30/mo · 200,000 credits (Discovery)
Pay-as-you-go Yes — prepaid from $20, no subscription No — monthly subscription required
Plain request (datacenter) 1 credit 1 credit
JS (Chromium) rendering 5 credits +5 credits
Residential proxies 10 credits (25 with JS) 25 credits (30 with JS)
Stealth / anti-bot tier 50 credits, fixed ASP: dynamic credit cost per request
Billing on failures Free — always, no threshold Free under "Scrape Failed Protection" (reverts to billed if >30% of traffic fails in an hour)
Natural-language Q&amp;A (<code>/ai/question</code>) Yes — (extraction via prompt/schema)
AI field extraction Yes (/ai/fields) Yes (Extraction API, billed as add-on)
LLM-ready text Yes (/text) Yes (markdown format)
Official SDKs 7 (Python, JS, PHP, Ruby, Go, Java, C#) Python & TypeScript
First-party MCP server Yes Yes
Screenshot API Yes

Pricing and credit costs last checked July 2026. Sources: ScrapFly pricing · WebScraping.AI pricing.

What ScrapFly does well

No tool is right for everyone. ScrapFly is a capable product, and these are the areas where it genuinely shines — worth weighing before you switch.

Anti-Scraping Protection (ASP) bypass — ScrapFly's flagship feature and a genuine benchmark for the hardest anti-bot targets.
Excellent documentation and tooling — docs, a web debugger/playground, and monitoring dashboards developers consistently praise.
Broad product surface — screenshot API, extraction API with LLM prompts and schemas, and a first-party MCP server.
Serious observability — per-request logs, webhooks, and throttling controls built into the platform.

Why developers look for a ScrapFly alternative

The most common reasons teams evaluate a switch.

The $30 plan doesn't stay $30

Residential proxies cost 25 credits and JS adds 5 more on ScrapFly, so a protected, JS-rendered scrape burns 30 credits — the 200k-credit Discovery plan collapses to ~6,600 such requests, and users report bills quietly tripling. WebScraping.AI's same configuration costs 25 credits on a 250k-credit $29 plan, and residential without JS is 10 credits, not 25.

ASP cost is dynamic

ScrapFly's anti-bot bypass consumes a variable number of credits depending on what the target requires, which makes hard-site budgets unpredictable. WebScraping.AI's stealth tier is a flat 50 credits per request — expensive targets are at least predictably expensive.

Failed-request protection has fine print

ScrapFly's Scrape Failed Protection stops applying once more than 30% of your traffic fails within an hour — exactly the scenario you're in when a target starts blocking you. WebScraping.AI simply never bills a failed request, with no fairness threshold.

No pay-as-you-go relief at entry

Every ScrapFly plan is a monthly subscription — exhaust Discovery's 200k credits and you're done for the month unless you upgrade tiers. WebScraping.AI sells prepaid pay-as-you-go top-ups from $20 with no subscription at all, and on a plan they act as overflow, spent only once the monthly quota runs out. Plans are self-serve and adjustable at any time, and more of your credits survive contact with real-world targets thanks to the flatter multipliers.

Transparent, published pricing

Every request type has a fixed, published credit cost — no surprises, and you only pay for successful requests.

Request type
No JS
+ JS render
Datacenter proxies
1 credit
5 credits
Residential proxies
10 credits
25 credits
Stealth proxies
50 credits
50 credits
AI extraction add-on
+5 credits

Plans from $29/mo (250k credits) · $99/mo (1M) · $249/mo (3M) · or pay-as-you-go from $20 (100k credits, no subscription, valid 12 months). Failed requests are always free. See full pricing.

Flatter credit math for the requests you actually make

Both products use credit multipliers — that's the market standard. The difference is where the multipliers sit. On ScrapFly, the moment a site needs residential IPs you're at 25 credits, and 30 with rendering. On WebScraping.AI, residential is 10 credits (25 with JS), and the whole table is published: 1 / 5 / 10 / 25 / 50, +5 for AI extraction.

Concretely, 100k JS-rendered residential requests cost 3M credits on ScrapFly's model (30 each) versus 2.5M on ours (25 each) — and each plan dollar buys more credits to begin with (250k at $29 vs 200k at $30). Every request that fails along the way costs you nothing, unconditionally.

AI answers, not just extractions

ScrapFly's Extraction API is capable — prompts, schemas, and auto-extract models. WebScraping.AI adds the endpoint developers reach for first when prototyping: /ai/question. Ask "what's the price?" or "is this in stock?" about any URL and get the answer back as a string — no schema required. When you're ready for structure, /ai/fields returns typed JSON for the fields you name.

Both ship first-party MCP servers, so the choice isn't about AI-agent readiness — it's about how much credit math and schema ceremony sits between you and the data.

Switching is one API call

Point your requests at WebScraping.AI — here's the equivalent call in your language.

curl -G "https://api.webscraping.ai/ai/fields" \
  --data-urlencode "api_key=YOUR_API_KEY" \
  --data-urlencode "url=https://example.com/product" \
  --data-urlencode "fields[title]=Product title" \
  --data-urlencode "fields[price]=Current price with currency" \
  --data-urlencode "fields[availability]=In stock or out of stock"
# Response:
# {
#   "title": "Example Product",
#   "price": "$99.99",
#   "availability": "in stock"
# }
# pip install webscraping_ai
# https://pypi.org/project/webscraping-ai/
from webscraping_ai import Client

client = Client(api_key="YOUR_API_KEY")
result = client.fields(
    "https://example.com/product",
    fields={
        "title": "Product title",
        "price": "Current price with currency",
        "availability": "In stock or out of stock",
    },
)
print(result)
# Response:
# {
#   "title": "Example Product",
#   "price": "$99.99",
#   "availability": "in stock"
# }
// npm install webscraping-ai
// https://www.npmjs.com/package/webscraping-ai
import { WebScrapingAI } from 'webscraping-ai';

const client = new WebScrapingAI({ apiKey: 'YOUR_API_KEY' });
const result = await client.fields({
  url: 'https://example.com/product',
  fields: {
    title: 'Product title',
    price: 'Current price with currency',
    availability: 'In stock or out of stock',
  },
});
console.log(result);
// Response:
// {
//   "title": "Example Product",
//   "price": "$99.99",
//   "availability": "in stock"
// }
<?php
// composer require webscraping-ai/webscraping-ai-php
// https://packagist.org/packages/webscraping-ai/webscraping-ai-php
require 'vendor/autoload.php';

use WebScrapingAI\Client;

$client = new Client('YOUR_API_KEY');
$result = $client->fields('https://example.com/product', [
    'title'        => 'Product title',
    'price'        => 'Current price with currency',
    'availability' => 'In stock or out of stock',
]);
print_r($result);
// Response:
// {
//   "title": "Example Product",
//   "price": "$99.99",
//   "availability": "in stock"
// }
# gem install webscraping_ai
# https://rubygems.org/gems/webscraping_ai
require 'webscraping_ai'

client = WebScrapingAI::Client.new(api_key: 'YOUR_API_KEY')
result = client.fields(
  'https://example.com/product',
  fields: {
    title:         'Product title',
    price:         'Current price with currency',
    availability:  'In stock or out of stock',
  }
)
puts result.inspect
# Response:
# {
#   "title": "Example Product",
#   "price": "$99.99",
#   "availability": "in stock"
# }
// go get github.com/webscraping-ai/webscraping-ai-go/v4
// https://pkg.go.dev/github.com/webscraping-ai/webscraping-ai-go/v4
package main

import (
    "context"
    "fmt"

    webscrapingai "github.com/webscraping-ai/webscraping-ai-go/v4"
)

func main() {
    client, _ := webscrapingai.NewClient(&webscrapingai.Config{APIKey: "YOUR_API_KEY"})
    result, _ := client.Fields(context.Background(), &webscrapingai.FieldsOptions{
        URL: "https://example.com/product",
        Fields: map[string]string{
            "title": "Product title",
            "price": "Current price with currency",
            "availability": "In stock or out of stock",
        },
    })
    fmt.Println(result.Result)
}
// Response:
// {
//   "title": "Example Product",
//   "price": "$99.99",
//   "availability": "in stock"
// }
// Maven: ai.webscraping:webscraping-ai:4.0.0
// https://central.sonatype.com/artifact/ai.webscraping/webscraping-ai
import ai.webscraping.Client;
import ai.webscraping.Config;
import ai.webscraping.option.FieldsOptions;
import ai.webscraping.result.FieldsResult;

Client client = new Client(Config.builder().apiKey("YOUR_API_KEY").build());
FieldsResult result = client.fields(FieldsOptions.builder()
    .url("https://example.com/product")
    .addField("title", "Product title")
    .addField("price", "Current price with currency")
    .addField("availability", "In stock or out of stock")
    .build());
System.out.println(result.getResult());
// Response:
// {
//   "title": "Example Product",
//   "price": "$99.99",
//   "availability": "in stock"
// }
// dotnet add package WebScrapingAI
// https://www.nuget.org/packages/WebScrapingAI
using WebScrapingAI;

var client = new WebScrapingAIClient(new WebScrapingAIClientOptions { ApiKey = "YOUR_API_KEY" });
var result = await client.FieldsAsync(new FieldsRequest {
    Url = "https://example.com/product",
    Fields = new Dictionary<string, string> {
        ["title"] = "Product title",
        ["price"] = "Current price with currency",
        ["availability"] = "In stock or out of stock",
    },
});
Console.WriteLine(result.Result);
// Response:
// {
//   "title": "Example Product",
//   "price": "$99.99",
//   "availability": "in stock"
// }

Switch to WebScraping.AI if…

Your workload leans on residential proxies — 10 credits here vs 25 there adds up fast.
You want fixed, published costs per request type, including a flat stealth tier instead of dynamic ASP billing.
You want failed requests free with no fairness threshold, especially on targets that block in bursts.
Your team works across many languages — 7 official SDKs vs Python and TypeScript.

Stick with ScrapFly if…

You're fighting the very hardest anti-bot targets and want ScrapFly's ASP plus its debugging tooling around it.
You need a screenshot API or ScrapFly's webhook/throttling infrastructure.
You're invested in ScrapFly's monitoring dashboards and per-request observability.

Frequently asked questions

Is WebScraping.AI a good ScrapFly alternative?

For most scraping workloads, yes: the same datacenter/residential/stealth proxy tiers and JS rendering with flatter credit costs (residential at 10 credits vs 25), unconditionally free failed requests, AI question answering and field extraction, and 7 official SDKs. ScrapFly keeps the edge on its specialized ASP anti-bot bypass and screenshot tooling.

How do the credit models compare?

Both use multipliers. WebScraping.AI: 1 credit plain, 5 with JS, 10 residential (25 with JS), 50 stealth, +5 for AI — all fixed and published. ScrapFly: 1 credit plain, +5 for JS, 25 residential, and a dynamic credit cost when ASP engages. Entry plans are $29/mo for 250k credits here vs $30/mo for 200k there.

Does ScrapFly charge for failed requests?

Normally no — its Scrape Failed Protection covers failures with eligible status codes. But the protection is suspended when more than 30% of your traffic fails within an hour, which is precisely what a blocking event looks like. WebScraping.AI never bills failed requests, with no threshold or fine print.

Can I buy WebScraping.AI credits without a monthly subscription?

Yes. Pay-as-you-go top-ups start at $20 for 100,000 credits ($0.0002 per credit) with no subscription required — useful for occasional or seasonal workloads that don't justify a monthly plan. ScrapFly requires a monthly subscription to buy credits at all. If you do have a plan, PAYG credits are consumed only after that month's quota runs out, and they stay valid for 12 months, with each new top-up extending the entire balance another 12 months.

Does WebScraping.AI handle anti-bot systems like ScrapFly's ASP?

Hard targets route through rotating residential proxies (10–25 credits) or stealth proxies (50 credits) designed for protected-site scraping. ScrapFly's ASP is a strong specialized system and may win on the most aggressively protected sites; the difference is our cost is flat and known before you send the request.

Can I use WebScraping.AI with AI agents like ScrapFly's MCP?

Yes — both ship first-party MCP servers. WebScraping.AI's exposes question answering, field extraction, HTML/text retrieval, and CSS-selector tools to Claude, Cursor, and other MCP clients, with content sandboxing against prompt injection enabled by default on the hosted server.

Compare other alternatives

Try WebScraping.AI as your ScrapFly alternative

Get started with 2,000 free API credits. No credit card required.

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