Cheerio vs Puppeteer: Which Should You Use for Web Scraping?

Web scraping tools are all over the internet. Some of them are free, some are paid, and all of them offer lists of promising features.

Yet, among the available web scraping tools, Cheerio and Puppeteer remain two of the most popular choices. But even if we shorten the list to just Cheerio vs Puppeteer, which one is actually better for your needs?

We’ll go straight to comparing the two web scraping tools, what exactly defines Cheerio and Puppeteer, what their main functionalities are, and which one can benefit you the most.

Cheerio vs Puppeteer: The Core Difference

Cheerio and Puppeteer are often mentioned together, but in reality, both tools solve very different problems. Let’s break down the key differences and how Cheerio and Puppeteer approach web scraping and automation.

Cheerio

Cheerio is one of the most popular HTML parsers. The tool is favored for its lightweight size and features, such as the Query-like API integration. And integration isn’t the only easy thing – Cheerio loads raw HTML strings for a smoother and faster experience.

However, what truly makes Cheerio stand out is that it doesn’t execute JavaScript or load external resources. Scraping static pages with existing content becomes as smooth as turning an on/off switch.

Puppeteer

Puppeteer is another widely used full browser automation tool that allows users to control a real Chromium browser, both headless and non-headless. The tool renders pages exactly like a user’s browser would, running JavaScript and handling network requests.

With the ability to mimic headless and non-headless browsers, Puppeteer is favored by many users who want to scrape dynamic website content, loading JavaScript-heavy sites that load content separately.

Quick Decision Guide

Choosing between Cheerio and Puppeteer is a question of what content you want to scrape. However, in reality, Cheerio and Puppeteer are used interchangeably because both tools approach web scraping from different angles. In short, the decision which one to choose boils down to one simple fact: what content you usually scrape.

Use Cheerio If:

• The content you want to scrape is on a server-rendered webpage (or a static HTML page). If you open a page’s source and already see the data you need, Cheerio will take it from there.
• You’re looking for a fast and resource-efficient web scraping method that doesn’t execute JavaScript.
• You only need data extraction that includes parsing tables, lists, metadata, or textual content without actually interacting with the page.

To summarize, Cheerio is an ideal tool for working with static HTML webpages that return content data directly in the HTML response.

Use Puppeteer If:

• The content you want to scrape requires JavaScript execution to load dynamic content via API’s or client-side rendering.
• You need to scroll, click, log in, or wait for UI changes – Puppeteer can imitate real user behavior and respond to loading elements on webpages.
• The websites you scrape are single-page applications (SPAs), use infinite scroll, or use frameworks like React, Vue, or Angular, which Cheerio can’t easily handle.

All in all, Puppeteer does a great job scraping dashboards, social media feeds and posts, authenticated pages, and, more importantly, websites with dynamic filters.

Use Both If:

• You find yourself working on different projects and tasks. Puppeteer can handle JavaScript and page interaction, after which Cheerio can step in to take care of HTML parsing.
• You want a successful outcome. Puppeteer guarantees content availability – Cheerio makes data extraction easier for manual and automated scraping.
• You need to improve your web scraping performance, allowing Puppeteer to minimize browser-side document object model (DOM) queries and leaving the parsing part to Cheerio.

Most common use cases include complex scraping workflows, calibrating large-scale crawlers, or scraping websites that only partially rely on JavaScript.

Cheerio vs Puppeteer: Side-by-Side Comparison

In short, Cheerio is better suited for simple web scraping tasks that target static pages, while Puppeteer is useful for scraping information from modern JavaScript-rich web pages.

Static vs Dynamic Scraping (Practical Examples)

Now that we’ve gone through the key differences between Puppeteer and Cheerio, it’s time to look at some practical examples showing the process of scraping websites with static content vs dynamic filters.

In this section, we’ll look at 3 of the main use case scenarios for using Cheerio, Puppeteer, or both. Just note that the content provided is meant to demonstrate and serve as an example rather than a step-by-step guide for each case.

Example 1: Scraping a Static Page With Cheerio

Let’s say you’re looking to scrape content from static pages to then parse the scraped data neatly and hassle-free. Cheerio can help scrape static pages easily as long as they return content directly in the HTML response. If this single requirement is complete, web scraping becomes as straightforward as it gets.

Here’s how a common workflow would look:

• You send an HTTP request to the page URL to fetch the raw HTML. Note that to use Cheerio, you first need to download the HTML of the web page using a library like axios, node-fetch, or the built-in Node.js before parsing it.
• Once the HTML source loads into Cheerio, you’ll need to use cascading style sheet (CSS) selectors to extract page titles, links, prices, and more.
• Best use cases: Scraping blogs, news articles, journals, product listings (in some cases), documentation, and documentation – provided they’re all server-rendered content.

CSS selector examples:

h1
.product
#price
a[href]

Example 2: Scraping a Dynamic Page With Puppeteer

We've already established that Puppeteer is best for scraping dynamic content, which relies heavily on JavaScript to retrieve and render content after the page you want to scrape loads. The main reason why this is necessary is that the initial HTML is either incomplete or entirely empty.

Typical workflow example of web scraping with Puppeteer :

• You need to install Node.js, create a project, and install Puppeteer.
• Once you have it set up, you can then launch a headless or full Chromium browser using Puppeteer.
• You send a request and wait for the required content to render, allowing JavaScript to execute.
• After the page loads the necessary elements and is visible in the DOM query, you can then go ahead and start web scraping to extract the target data.
• Best use cases: scraping dashboards, analytics tools, SPAs, "Load more" pages, or infinite scroll pages.

The Hybrid Approach (Cheerio + Puppeteer)

Some starting web scrapers, even professional ones, make a rather common mistake of looking at rendering and parsing as the same thing when they're not. Sure, some use cases can certainly benefit from a single solution, but a hybrid approach can bring out the best of both Cheerio and Puppeteer.

Rendering and Parsing are Different Concerns

First things first, we have to separate rendering and parsing. Rendering is all about making sure all content loads properly after JavaScript execution in a browser. Parsing helps to extract data from an HTML response on a server. That's exactly why trying to do both, rendering and parsing, with one tool can lead to hiccups and even errors.

The Common Pattern

The way a hybrid method works is by running Puppeteer to handle JavaScript, loading pages in real browsers to extract the final rendered HTML response. Cheerio can then handle data extraction by loading the HTML snapshot into Cheerio and using jQuery selectors to get clean and structured data.

When This Clearly Outperforms Puppeteer Alone

Cheerio is an efficient and lightweight tool for extracting multiple fields from the same page and scraping thousands of pages with precision, speed, and simplicity. While it's true that Cheerio can only handle content visible in HTML on servers, this also leads to incredible speed and noticeably lower CPU or memory usage.

Performance and Scalability Notes

If you're looking for performance or scalability, there's no one answer that clearly states whether Cheerio or Puppeteer is better. However, we can look at this problem from a performance and scalability perspective individually.

When it comes to scalability, Cheerio scales much better for high-volume scraping. This tool runs on Node.js with no browser – leading to less resource consumption and more results for batch scraping, parallel working, or dealing with serverless or constrained environments.

On the other hand, while Puppeteer is heavier and requires more memory usage with slower load times, the tool is essential for working with SPA frameworks, client-side rendering, and automated workflows.

Bottom Line

Cheerio and Puppeteer are two popular tools for web scraping, but their use cases often leave most of us questioning which one is better. However, the answer is that both tools approach web scraping from different angles and should be used either as needed or together for the best results – accurate rendering with fast and problem-free data extraction.

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