MeshArc
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alternative · scrapingbee

The ScrapingBee alternative for crawling whole sites, again and again

ScrapingBee is a clean API for reading one URL at a time. When you need whole sites crawled on a schedule, what changed since last time, and the results in your database, MeshArc does the crawling, the comparing and the delivery for you.
Start free — 1,000 creditsSee the pricing compared

No card. 1,000 credits to start. Blocked pages, 404s and unchanged pages are never charged.

01why teams switch

What you stop building yourself

  • The crawler: ScrapingBee reads the URL you send it; finding the pages is up to your code. Here you give a site or a sitemap section, and MeshArc finds the pages and keeps to the scope.
  • The comparison: every run is compared with the last: pages added, changed and removed, prices and dates diffed field by field. A page that has not changed costs nothing.
  • The bill for missing pages: ScrapingBee charges for a 404 as it does for a 200. Here a 404 and a blocked page are free.
  • The pipeline: 18 destinations, from Postgres and BigQuery to Pinecone and Kafka, instead of a response you store yourself.
02pricing

ScrapingBee pricing and MeshArc pricing

Both sell credits. ScrapingBee prices a request by the options it used; MeshArc prices a page by how it had to be read, and climbs only when a page needs it.

ScrapingBeeMeshArc
Free to try1,000 credits, no card1,000 credits once, no card
Monthly plansHobby $19, Freelance $49, Startup $99, Business $249, Business+ $599Starter $29, Growth $99, Scale $349; Enterprise from $1,500
Credits for $991,000,000 (Startup)500,000 (Growth)
A page with JavaScript5 credits, and rendering is on by default4 credits, only for the pages that need it
Billed200 and 404 responsesPages read; blocked pages, 404s and unchanged pages are free
Per 1,000 pagesScrapingBee Startup ($99)MeshArc Growth ($99)MeshArc Scale ($349)
Plain page, no JavaScript$0.10$0.20$0.14
Page rendered in a browser$0.50$0.79$0.56
Protected site$0.99–2.48 with a premium proxy, $7.43 stealth$0.40 once a session is earned$0.28
404$0.10–0.50freefree

ScrapingBee’s figures follow from its pricing page and documentation, read on 1 October 2026: 1,000,000 credits for $99, and a request costs 1 credit without JavaScript, 5 with it, 10 with a premium proxy, 25 with a premium proxy and JavaScript, and 75 with the stealth proxy. MeshArc’s are list prices.

03side by side

What each one does

ScrapingBeeMeshArc
Read one URL through an APIYesYes
Crawl a whole site or a sitemap sectionNo: one URL per requestYes, with scope and a schedule
What changed since the last runNoBuilt in, down to the field
404 billedYesNo
ScreenshotsYesYes
Ready-made APIs for Google results and some large sitesYesNo
Results stored for youNo: your code keeps the response18 destinations

ScrapingBee facts from scrapingbee.com and its documentation, checked on 1 October 2026; we review them quarterly.

04when not to switch

Where ScrapingBee is the better choice

For one-off reads of pages that need no protection, ScrapingBee’s price per request is lower than ours, and it has ready-made APIs for Google results and some large sites. If you read each URL once and keep the response yourself, it is a good fit. MeshArc earns its keep on the second crawl.

05migrating

Switch in an afternoon

  • Swap the URL list for the site: give a site or a sitemap section; MeshArc finds the pages.
  • Drop the render flag: every page is read plainly first and rendered only if it needs it.
  • Put it on a schedule: later runs report what changed.
  • Point the output: at one of 18 destinations, or read it from the API.
06more comparisons

Comparing with someone else?

Firecrawl alternativeChange tracking, free failures and somewhere for the data to land.Apify alternativePay per page, not per minute of compute, with change tracking and no actor to maintain.Bright Data alternativeOrdinary pages at ordinary prices, repeat visits cheaper, and what changed.ZenRows alternativeProtected sites read for less on every visit after the first.
questions

Frequently asked questions

What is the best ScrapingBee alternative?

If you read single URLs and keep the HTML, other request APIs such as ZenRows and Scrapfly are close substitutes; the compare page has them side by side. If you crawl the same sites on a schedule and need what changed, delivered to your database, MeshArc is built for that.

How much does ScrapingBee cost?

Plans run from Hobby at $19 a month for 75,000 credits to Business+ at $599 for 8,000,000, with 1,000 free credits to try. A request costs 1 credit without JavaScript and 5 with it, and rendering is on by default; a premium proxy costs 10 or 25, the stealth proxy 75. Figures from scrapingbee.com, read on 1 October 2026.

Does ScrapingBee charge for 404 pages?

Yes. It bills 200 and 404 responses and does not bill a failed request. MeshArc bills neither a 404 nor a blocked page, nor a page that has not changed since the last run.

Is there a free web scraping API?

Most offer a trial rather than a free tier: ScrapingBee gives 1,000 credits, and MeshArc 1,000 credits once with no card. For ongoing use at small volume, ZenRows and Bright Data each include 5,000 a month.

Try it on the site you scrape most

Give it the site, not the URL list, and look at the second run.

Start freeOpen the playground