Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

WebSite-Watcher VS ScrapingBee

Compare WebSite-Watcher VS ScrapingBee and see what are their differences

Note: These products don't have any matching categories. If you think this is a mistake, please edit the details of one of the products and suggest appropriate categories.

WebSite-Watcher logo WebSite-Watcher

WebSite-Watcher detects website updates and highlights all changes in the text. WebSite-Watcher monitors web pages, password protected pages, disucssion forums and much more.

ScrapingBee logo ScrapingBee

ScrapingBee is a Web Scraping API that handles proxies and Headless browser for you, so you can focus on extracting the data you want, and nothing else.
  • WebSite-Watcher Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-09-12
  • ScrapingBee Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-01-12

Web Scraping is hard, scraping at scale can be very challenging.

You have to handle:

  • Javascript rendering 💻
  • Chrome headless 🛠
  • Captcha 🤖
  • Proxy 🕵️‍♀️

ScrapingBee is a simple API that does all the above for you, and much more.

ScrapingBee

$ Details
freemium $49.0 / Monthly (Freelance / 10,000 searches / 100,000 credits)
Platforms
REST API
Release Date
2019 July

WebSite-Watcher features and specs

  • Comprehensive Monitoring
    WebSite-Watcher allows you to monitor websites for changes comprehensively, including content updates, new posts, and changes in specific sections.
  • Customization
    The tool offers a high degree of customization, allowing users to set specific criteria for monitoring, such as keywords, frequency of checks, and types of changes to track.
  • Multi-Platform Support
    WebSite-Watcher supports a variety of platforms, including Windows, and also offers mobile alerts, making it highly versatile.
  • User-Friendly Interface
    The software features a user-friendly interface that makes it easy for both novices and advanced users to configure and manage their website monitoring tasks.
  • Automation
    The tool supports automation through scripts and macros, enabling advanced users to automate complex monitoring tasks and integrate WebSite-Watcher into their workflows.

Possible disadvantages of WebSite-Watcher

  • Cost
    WebSite-Watcher is a paid software, and while it offers a free trial, the full version may be considered expensive for individual users or small businesses.
  • Learning Curve
    Due to its extensive features and customization options, there might be a steep learning curve, particularly for users who are new to website monitoring tools.
  • Windows-Centric
    The software is primarily designed for Windows, which may limit accessibility for users on other operating systems like macOS or Linux.
  • Resource Intensive
    Running WebSite-Watcher continuously can be resource-intensive, which might affect the performance of lower-end computers.
  • Limited Mobile Functionality
    While mobile alerts are supported, the overall functionality and user experience on mobile devices are limited compared to the desktop version.

ScrapingBee features and specs

  • Easy to Use
    ScrapingBee provides a simple API that allows developers to scrape web pages without worrying about handling proxies or web browser rendering.
  • JavaScript Rendering
    With built-in JavaScript rendering, ScrapingBee can handle complex web pages that rely heavily on JavaScript for content display, making it suitable for scraping modern websites.
  • Proxy Management
    ScrapingBee automatically manages proxies, meaning developers don't have to deal with proxy rotation, blacklisting, or bans.
  • Rate Limiting Control
    The service offers control over rate limits, making it possible to scrape at a custom speed that suits your needs and prevents being blocked by target websites.
  • Custom Headers Support
    ScrapingBee allows the use of custom headers, enabling users to mimic different browsers or add specific headers required by the target site.
  • Geolocation
    It provides geolocation-based scraping, which is useful for accessing content that is region-restricted.

Possible disadvantages of ScrapingBee

  • Cost
    ScrapingBee is a paid service, and costs can add up depending on the volume and complexity of your scraping needs.
  • Rate Limits
    Even though it offers control over rate limits, there are still predefined limits depending on your plan, which might not suit very high-volume scraping needs.
  • Dependency on External Service
    Relying on an external service means that you are dependent on ScrapingBee's uptime and performance, which may affect your operations if the service faces downtime.
  • Data Privacy
    Using a third-party service for web scraping means sharing your scraping activities with ScrapingBee, which could raise data privacy concerns.
  • Limited Customization
    While ScrapingBee handles many aspects of web scraping for you, it may not offer the level of customization that a self-built scraping solution could provide.

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to WebSite-Watcher and ScrapingBee)
Monitoring Tools
100 100%
0% 0
Web Scraping
0 0%
100% 100
Uptime Monitoring
100 100%
0% 0
Data Extraction
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

Share your experience with using WebSite-Watcher and ScrapingBee. For example, how are they different and which one is better?
Log in or Post with

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, ScrapingBee seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 3 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

WebSite-Watcher mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of WebSite-Watcher yet. Tracking of WebSite-Watcher recommendations started around Mar 2021.

ScrapingBee mentions (3)

  • Self-hosted, simple web browser service – send URL, get screenshots
    If you’re worried about the security risks, edge cases, maintenance pain and scaling challenges of self hosting there are various solid hosted alternatives: - https://browserless.io - low level browser control - https://scrapingbee.com - scraping specialists - https://urlbox.com - screenshot specialists* They’re all profitable and have been around for years so you can depend on the businesses and the tech. *... - Source: Hacker News / 3 months ago
  • Are there any APIs that maintain a database of subscriptions?
    If you really just need the data you can use something like https://scrapingbee.com to scrape the info from the various price pages to make sure your info is always up to date. Source: about 2 years ago
  • Our bootstrapped SaaS just turned 3 and reached $1.5m ARR: the lessons learned.
    Well done! And posting here was a great idea. Not sure I would have found scrapingbee.com otherwise. We will probably become a customer. Signed up for the trial account. Source: almost 3 years ago

What are some alternatives?

When comparing WebSite-Watcher and ScrapingBee, you can also consider the following products

Visualping - Visualping is the easiest to use website checker, webpage change monitoring, website change detector and website change alert software of the web. Read more about Visualping.

Zyte - We're Zyte (formerly Scrapinghub), the central point of entry for all your web data needs.

Wachete - Track web page changes and get notified. Free Sign-up. Have all data in one place

Apify - Apify is a web scraping and automation platform that can turn any website into an API.

Distill Web Monitor - Distill is a web monitoring tool. It can monitor RSS feeds, a webpage or a part of webpage. Alerts in the form of pop-up, audio or emails can be received.

Bright Data - World's largest proxy service with a residential proxy network of 72M IPs worldwide and proxy management interface for zero coding.