WebReaper
AI-native web scraper: scrape, crawl and map any site to clean markdown over stdio. MIT-licensed.
Open source Open in the app JSON README (API)
About
AI-native web scraper: scrape, crawl and map any site to clean markdown over stdio. MIT-licensed.
Details
- Kind
- MCP servers
- Topic
- Web search, scraping & browser
- Publisher
- alex-on-ai
- Origin
- official
- Category
- ferramentas
- Transport
- local
- Version
- 11.3.2
- Stars
- 147
- Forks
- 33
- Open pull requests
- 2
- Last push
- 2026-07-11T12:19:45Z
- Repository state
- ativo
- Language
- C#
- License
- MIT
- Added
- 2026-08-29 03:02:24
- Updated
- 2026-08-29 03:02:24
- Origin id
io.github.alex-on-ai/webreaper
README
# WebReaper
[](https://www.nuget.org/packages/WebReaper)
[](https://github.com/alex-on-ai/WebReaper/actions/workflows/CI.yml)
[](LICENSE.txt)
AI-native web scraper. Single binary with a bundled Claude Code skill.
Built by [HighCraft.io](https://highcraft.io).
## Install
**macOS / Linux (Homebrew):**
```bash
brew install alex-on-ai/webreaper/webreaper
```
**Any POSIX shell (install.sh):**
```bash
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/alex-on-ai/WebReaper/master/scripts/install.sh | sh
```
**.NET library:**
```bash
dotnet add package WebReaper
```
Windows binaries are on the [GitHub Releases page](https://github.com/alex-on-ai/WebReaper/releases/latest); `winget` and `Scoop` are on the v10.1 roadmap.
**Updating:** `brew upgrade webreaper` (Homebrew), or re-run the install.sh line with `--upgrade` appended (`| sh -s -- --upgrade`), or `dotnet add package WebReaper` (library). When a newer release exists, `scrape` / `crawl` / `map` print a one-line upgrade hint on stderr (interactive terminals only, never in a pipe or CI); disable that check with `WEBREAPER_NO_UPDATE_CHECK=1`.
## 30-second demo
```bash
$ webreaper scrape https://news.ycombinator.com
# Hacker News
- [Show HN: ...](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=...)
- [Ask HN: ...](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=...)
...
$ webreaper init
Wrote WebReaper Agent Skill to .claude/skills/webreaper/SKILL.md
Try it out:
webreaper scrape https://example.com
webreaper map https://example.com
```
After `webreaper init`, the next Claude Code session picks up the skill and routes scraping intents (*"give me the markdown of X"*, *"what blog posts are on Y"*, *"scrape the top 5 articles"*) to `webreaper` automatically.
## Table of contents
- [Why WebReaper](#why-webreaper)
- [Quick start](#quick-start)
- [Bot protection that just works](#bot-protection-that-just-works)
- [Power your agent](#power-your-agent)
- [AI features](#ai-features)
- [Use cases](#use-cases)
- [Packages](#packages)
- [Compared to Firecrawl, Crawl4AI, and Crawlee](#compared-to-firecrawl-crawl4ai-and-crawlee)
- [API overview](#api-overview)
- [Architecture and interfaces](docs/architecture.md)
- [Repository structure](#repository-structure)
- [License](#license)
## Why WebReaper
<table>
<tr>
<td width="33%" valign="top"><strong>🪶 Drop on PATH, run.</strong><br><br>No Docker, no Postgres, no signup. ~12 MB binary.</td>
<td width="33%" valign="top"><strong>🤖 AI-native by composition.</strong><br><br>Markdown by default. Schema extraction, LLM fallback, self-healing selectors, autonomous agent. Stack with <code>.With…()</code>.</td>
<td width="33%" valign="top"><strong>🔌 Bring any LLM.</strong><br><br>OpenAI, Anthropic, Ollama, Azure OpenAI, llamafile, via <code>Microsoft.Extensions.AI</code>.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="33%" valign="top"><strong>🛡 Bot-checks handled automatically.</strong><br><br>A blocked page climbs HTTP → browser → stealth on its own, per page and host-sticky. Challenge pages are dropped, never returned as data. No flag needed for the browser fallback.</td>
<td width="33%" valign="top"><strong>📡 Distributed when needed.</strong><br><br>Swap scheduler, tracker, sink to Redis, MongoDB, SQLite, Azure Service Bus, Cosmos. Same code.</td>
<td width="33%" valign="top"><strong>📜 MIT, not AGPL.</strong><br><br>Embed in commercial software, fork, modify, redistribute. Firecrawl's AGPL requires open-sourcing your service or paying for a commercial license.</td>
</tr>
</table>
## Quick start
### CLI
```bash
# One page as Markdown
webreaper scrape https://example.com
# Save Markdown to a file
webreaper scrape https://example.com --output page.md
# Discover URLs on a site
webreaper map https://example.com --search /blog/ --max-urls 50
# Crawl a whole site recursively (every on-domain page) to JSON Lines
webreaper crawl https://example.com > pages.jsonl
# Structured fields with a JSON schema (output: JSON; multi-page: JSON Lines)
webreaper scrape https://example.com --schema schema.json
# Schema-free extraction with an LLM (bring your own OpenAI-compatible endpoint)
webreaper scrape https://example.com --prompt "title and author" \
--model gpt-4o-mini --llm-url https://api.openai.com/v1
# Whole site, fields, cheaply: infer a schema once, then extract the rest
webreaper crawl https://example.com --infer "product name and price" \
--model gpt-4o-mini --llm-url https://api.openai.com/v1 --output-dir ./out
# JS-rendered single-page app
webreaper scrape https://example.com --browser
# Bot-protected site: a plain scrape already auto-climbs HTTP -> browser on a
# block; --stealth starts at a stealth backend (--auto-stealth = no prompt, for CI)
webreaper scrape https://example.com --stealth
# Install the Claude Code skill
webreaper init
```
The CLI is built Native-AOT (ADR-0043), ships as a single binary on every tagged GitHub release across six RIDs (`linux-x64`, `linux-arm64`, `osx-x64`, `osx-arm64`, `win-x64`, `win-arm64`), and is block-aware with automatic browser/stealth escalation (ADR-0083). The macOS binaries are Apple codesigned and notarized (ADR-0071); Homebrew installs run without Gatekeeper warnings on a clean machine.
### Library
```csharp
using WebReaper.Builders;
var engine = await ScraperEngineBuilder
.Crawl("https://news.ycombinator.com")
.AsMarkdown()
.WriteToConsole()
.BuildAsync();
await engine.RunAsync();
```
That is HTTP-only, no extra packages, no schema. For structured fields, swap `AsMarkdown()` for `Extract(schema)`; for JS-rendered pages, `Crawl` for `CrawlWithBrowser` plus a transport satellite ([`WebReaper.Playwright`](#packages) or [`WebReaper.Cdp`](#packages)). The full surface is in the [API overview](#api-overview).
## Bot protection that just works
Most scrapers make you opt into a browser up front and guess when a site is blocking you. WebReaper detects the block and escalates on its own, one page at a time:
```
HTTP -> browser (Chromium) -> stealth (CloakBrowser)
(climbs only when a page actually looks blocked)
```
- **Automatic.** A plain `scrape` or `crawl` starts on a fast HTTP fetch and climbs to a real browser only when a page looks blocked (a challenge status, response header, or body marker). No flag needed for the browser fallback.
- **Per page, host-sticky.** The first confirmed block on a host lifts that host's floor, so the rest of a whole-site crawl starts at the working tier instead of re-paying the failed one. You pay for the climb once, not per page.
- **No garbage in your data.** A page still blocked at the top tier is dropped, never written to your output, and the run exits non-zero so an unattended job knows. Clean data or a clear signal, never a challenge page masquerading as content.
- **You decide on stealth.** `--stealth` starts at the stealth backend; `--auto-stealth` (or `WEBREAPER_AUTO_STEALTH=1`) enables it unattended; `--no-auto-stealth` caps the climb at a vanilla browser. The ~220 MB stealth backend downloads only if you opt in.
Self-hosted, single binary, no cloud round-trip ([ADR-0083](docs/adr/0083-escalating-page-loader.md)).
## Power your agent
Onboarding an agent from zero? Hand it [docs/AI-ONBOARDING.md](docs/AI-ONBOARDING.md) — install → verify → choose-your-path on one page, no credentials anywhere.
### Claude Code skill
```bash
webreaper init
```
Writes a polished `SKILL.md` to `.claude/skills/webreaper/`. Claude Code loads it on the next session and routes scraping intents to the CLI: *"scrape the top 5 stories on HN and summarize each"*, *"give me the markdown of this article"*, *"this Cloudflare-protected site is blocking me"*. The skill describes when to prefer `webreaper` over the built-in `WebFetch` (artifacts and structured data go through `webreaper`; conversational answers stay on `WebFetch`).
### MCP server
Two MCP servers expose the same tools (`scrape`, `map`, `extract`, `extract_with_prompt`, `extract_inferred`, `crawl`) for clients that speak the Model Context Protocol:
- **[`WebReaper.Mcp`](https://www.nuget.org/packages/WebReaper.Mcp)** (ADR-0049) speaks **stdio**, for local clients that spawn a process: Cursor, Claude Desktop, Copilot Studio.
- **[`WebReaper.Mcp.AspNetCore`](https://www.nuget.org/packages/WebReaper.Mcp.AspNetCore)** (ADR-0086) speaks **Streamable HTTP**, for clients that connect to a URL. The headline case is **n8n**, whose MCP Client node is URL-only and cannot reach a stdio server. Run the Chromium-baked image, point n8n's MCP Client node at the URL with a bearer token, and call the tools from a workflow:
```bash
docker run -p 8080:8080 -e WEBREAPER_MCP_TOKEN=your-secret \
ghcr.io/alex-on-ai/webreaper-mcp-http:latest
```
See the [n8n quickstart](docs/mcp-http-quickstart.md).
Both are thin facades over the library API; the primary agent surface remains the CLI.
### CLI inside any agent harness
The single binary works inside any shell-spawning agent: LangChain `ShellTool`, OpenAI Assistants code-interpreter, GitHub Actions, internal scripts. Zero runtime to install; one syscall to invoke.
## AI features
### 1. LLM-ready Markdown, no schema
```csharp
await ScraperEngineBuilder
.Crawl("https://example.com")
.AsMarkdown() // ADR-0040 + ADR-0063
.WriteToConsole()
.BuildAsync()
.Result.RunAsync();
```
The Markdown extractor (`HtmlToMarkdown` primitive, ADR-0063; `MarkdownContentExtractor` adapter, ADR-0040) emits `{title, markdown}` per page. Pass the output straight into a follow-up LLM prompt.
### 2. Source-gen schemas with compile-time guards
```csharp
using WebReaper.Extraction.Attributes;
[ScrapeSchema]
public partial class Article
{
[ScrapeField("h1")] public string? Title { get; set; }
[ScrapeField(".views", Type = SchemaFieldType.Integer)] public int Views { get; set; }
[ScrapeField(".tag", IsList = true)] public List<string> Tags { get; set; } = new();
}
// Emitted at compile time, reflection-free, AOT-clean:
// public static Schema Schema { get; }
// public static Article Materialize(JsonObject json)
var engine = await ScraperEngineBuilder
.Crawl("https://example.com/post")
.Extract(Article.Schema)
.Subscribe(p => HandleArticle(Article.Materialize(p.Data)))
.BuildAsync();
```
The [`WebReaper.Extraction.Generators`](https://www.nuget.org/packages/WebReaper.Extraction.Generators) Roslyn analyzer (ADR-0045) emits the schema and a `Materialize` function. Schema typos are compile errors; the generated path uses no reflection so it's AOT-clean.
### 3. LLM safety net for deterministic extraction
Three composable patterns where the LLM only fires when the deterministic path can't deliver. Same proposer-validator shape across all three.
```csharp
using WebReaper.AI;
// (a) Fire LLM only when a field returns empty (ADR-0046)
.WithLlmFallback(chatClient)
// (b) Repair a broken selector once per (Schema, field), cache forever (ADR-0047)
.WithLlmSelfHealing(chatClient)
// (c) No schema at all: infer it from the URL, re-infer on validator failure (ADR-0067 + ADR-0069)
.UseAi(chatClient, AiPolicyMode.Inferred)
```
Stable pages cost zero LLM calls; broken pages cost one call per (page, field) and cache. Schema inference is one call per site (cached for the run). The `WebReaper.AI` satellite is built on `Microsoft.Extensions.AI` so any `IChatClient` works.
### 4. Autonomous agent: page selection by goal
```csharp
using WebReaper.AI;
var result = await LlmAgent.RunAsync(
"https://example.com",
goal: "Find the contact email and phone number for the support team.",
chatClient);
```
`AgentEngine` (ADR-0051) runs a sequential `decide → persist → execute` loop over a closed-sum `AgentDecision` (`Extract | Follow | Act | Stop`). The brain picks each step from the bounded `AgentState` view; the engine validates (visited-link enforcement, MaxSteps cap), persists (`IAgentRunStore`), and dispatches. Durable resume across process restarts.
### 5. Semantic page actions
```csharp
ScraperEngineBuilder
.CrawlWithBrowser(url, actions => actions
.Do(PageAction.SemanticAct("click 'sign in'")) // ADR-0050
.Do(PageAction.WaitForNetworkIdle())
.Build())
.WithLlmActionResolver(chatClient)
// ...
```
A natural-language `PageAction.SemanticAct(intent)` is one of the ten closed-sum arms (ADR-0050 added it; ADR-0074 added `Fill` / `Press` / `ScrollIntoView` for form interactions). The transport resolves it once via the registered `IActionResolver` (LLM-backed by default), dispatches the concrete arm, and caches the resolution per crawl by intent string. First page pays the LLM, subsequent same-intent pages dispatch the cached arm with no LLM call.
### Runnable end-to-end demo
[`Examples/WebReaper.AiNativeShowcase`](Examples/WebReaper.AiNativeShowcase/Program.cs) wires every feature in this section:
```bash
dotnet run --project Examples/WebReaper.AiNativeShowcase -- markdown
dotnet run --project Examples/WebReaper.AiNativeShowcase -- sourcegen
dotnet run --project Examples/WebReaper.AiNativeShowcase -- llm
dotnet run --project Examples/WebReaper.AiNativeShowcase -- router
dotnet run --project Examples/WebReaper.AiNativeShowcase -- changetrack
```
## Use cases
- **Build LLM context from blog or docs sites.** `webreaper map` plus `webreaper scrape` per URL, piped into a prompt or a vector DB.
- **Monitor competitor pricing or status pages for changes.** Schedule the CLI with cron or a worker, store records in MongoDB or SQLite, plug in `.WithChangeTracking()` (ADR-0048) so the sink fires only on diff. Hash-based dedup; cron-friendly.
- **Run an autonomous research agent.** `LlmAgent.RunAsync(url, goal, chatClient)` decides which links to follow until the goal is met. Durable resume across restarts.
- **Scrape Cloudflare-protected catalogs.** A plain `scrape` auto-climbs HTTP to a browser on a block; add `--stealth` (or `--auto-stealth` for unattended runs) to escalate to a stealth backend. Blocked pages are dropped, never emitted as challenge-page garbage.
- **Generate clean datasets from semi-structured pages.** `[ScrapeSchema]` POCO plus the source generator; reflection-free, AOT-compiles into a native binary.
- **Embed a scraping primitive in your own app.** `dotnet add package WebReaper`; the public registration seam lets you plug Redis, Cosmos DB, your own sink.
## Packages
The release ships fifteen packages (one core, fourteen satellites), all versioned in lockstep. The core stays dependency-light and Native-AOT-publishable with zero warnings; satellites bring their own SDK dependencies and quarantine them off the core graph (ADR-0009).
| Package | Add it for | Key builder calls |
|---|---|---|
| **WebReaper** | Core. HTTP crawl and parse, in-memory and file scheduler / visited-link tracker / cookie and config storage, Console / CSV / JSON-Lines sinks, Markdown extractor, schema fold. Dependency-light, Native-AOT-ready, Newtonsoft-free. | `Crawl` `Extract` `AsMarkdown` `Follow` `Paginate` `Sweep` `WriteToJsonFile` `WriteToCsvFile` `WriteToConsole` `Subscribe` |
| **WebReaper.Cdp** | Raw CDP `IPageLoadTransport` (ADR-0052). AOT-clean (no PuppeteerSharp / Playwright dependency); System.Net.WebSockets plus System.Text.Json source-gen. Bedrock for the stealth pattern. | `.WithCdpPageLoader(cdpUrl)` (BYO) or `.WithCdpPageLoader(CdpLaunchOptions)` (launch managed Chromium) |
| **WebReaper.Playwright** | Microsoft.Playwright-backed transport (ADR-0053). Multi-browser (Chromium default; Firefox / WebKit opt-in). All ten `PageAction` arms supported. Use for modern multi-browser needs; pair with `WebReaper.Cdp` for AOT or stealth. | `.WithPlaywrightPageLoader()` |
| **WebReaper.Stealth.CloakBrowser** | First stealth-backend satellite (ADR-0054). Auto-downloads CloakBrowser on first use; composes on `WebReaper.Cdp`. Disposable via the ADR-0058 engine teardown chain. | `.WithCloakBrowser()` |
| **WebReaper.AI** | LLM extraction, LLM action resolver, LLM brain, LLM self-healing, LLM schema inferrer (ADR-0044 / 0050 / 0051 / 0067). Built on `Microsoft.Extensions.AI`; bring your own `IChatClient`. | `.WithLlmFallback` `.WithLlmSelfHealing` `.WithLlmExtractor` `.WithLlmAgentBrain` `.WithLlmActionResolver` `.WithLlmSchemaInferrer` `.UseAi(client)` |
| **WebReaper.AI.Http** | AOT-safe OpenAI-compatible `IChatClient` (ADR-0084): raw `HttpClient` plus System.Text.Json source-gen, no provider SDK. The bring-your-own client the AOT CLI and the MCP servers use for prompt extraction. | `new OpenAiCompatibleChatClient(baseUrl, model, apiKey)` |
| **WebReaper.Extraction.Attributes** | The `[ScrapeSchema]` / `[ScrapeField]` marker types. Standalone, no runtime cost. | `[ScrapeSchema]` `[ScrapeField("selector")]` |
| **WebReaper.Extraction.Generators** | Roslyn source generator that emits `static Schema` plus reflection-free `static Materialize(JsonObject)` (ADR-0045). `DevelopmentDependency=true`; does not propagate at runtime. | compile-time only |
| **WebReaper.Mcp** | MCP server `Exe` exposing scrape / map / extract / extract_with_prompt / extract_inferred / crawl as MCP tools over **stdio** (ADR-0049). Interop adapter for local MCP clients (Cursor, Claude Desktop). | the package _is_ the executable |
| **WebReaper.Mcp.AspNetCore** | MCP server over **Streamable HTTP** (ADR-0086) for URL-based clients like n8n; same tools as `WebReaper.Mcp`, plus bearer-token auth and a `WEBREAPER_CDP_URL` browser sidecar. Also ships as a Chromium-baked container image. | the package _is_ the executable; or `docker run ghcr.io/alex-on-ai/webreaper-mcp-http` |
| **WebReaper.Mongo** | MongoDB result sink and MongoDB-backed config / cookie storage. | `.WriteToMongoDb(...)` `.WithMongoDbConfigStorage(...)` `.WithMongoDbCookieStorage(...)` |
| **WebReaper.Redis** | Redis scheduler, visited-link tracker, result sink, config / cookie storage. | `.WithRedisScheduler(...)` `.TrackVisitedLinksInRedis(...)` `.WriteToRedis(...)` `.WithRedisConfigStorage(...)` `.WithRedisCookieStorage(...)` |
| **WebReaper.AzureServiceBus** | Distributed scheduler over an Azure Service Bus queue. | `.WithAzureServiceBusScheduler(...)` |
| **WebReaper.Cosmos** | Azure Cosmos DB result sink. | `.WriteToCosmosDb(...)` |
| **WebReaper.Sqlite** | Local **durable** scheduler and visited-link tracker on an embedded SQLite store; resume is a query, no position file. Opt-in robust-local tier (no server, unlike Redis). | `.WithSqliteScheduler(...)` `.TrackVisitedLinksInSqlite(...)` |
`WebReaper.Cli` (the AOT single-binary; ADR-0043) is not a NuGet package; it ships as platform binaries on every GitHub release (Native-AOT plus `dotnet tool install` are mutually incompatible on one target). Install via Homebrew or `install.sh`, or build from source.
## Compared to Firecrawl, Crawl4AI, and Crawlee
| | WebReaper | Firecrawl | Crawl4AI | WebFetch (Claude) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| **License** | MIT | AGPL-3.0 (plus commercial) | Apache 2.0 | bundled with Claude |
| **Install** | one binary, ~12 MB | Docker + Postgres + Redis (self-host) or hosted | Docker + Python + Playwright | nothing to install |
| **Cost** | free | metered API plus free tier | free | included with Claude |
| **BYO LLM** | any `IChatClient` | no (their model) | yes (LiteLLM) | Claude only |
| **Autonomous agent** | `Agent.RunAsync()` durable, in-process | `/agent` endpoint (cloud only) | code it yourself | not available |
| **Whole-site crawl** | `webreaper crawl` / `.Sweep()`: recursive, on-domain, sitemap-seeded, streams JSON Lines | `crawl` (cloud or self-host) | deep-crawl strategies (code it yourself) | no (single fetch) |
| **Page actions** | 10 declarative arms: `Click`, `Wait`, `Fill`, `Press`, `ScrollToEnd`, `ScrollIntoView`, `WaitForSelector`, `WaitForNetworkIdle`, `EvaluateExpression`, `SemanticAct` (natural-language) | 9 actions: `wait`, `click`, `write`, `press`, `scroll`, `executeJavascript`, plus 3 observation (`screenshot`, `pdf`, `scrape`) | JS hooks; no closed-sum vocabulary | none (single-fetch only) |
| **Bot-protected** | automatic HTTP → browser → stealth climb, per page, host-sticky, self-hosted | cloud yes; self-host degraded (no Fire-engine) | BYO | no |
| **Claude Code skill** | `webreaper init` bundled | community `firecrawl-claude-code-skill` wraps the cloud API | none official | not applicable |
[Crawlee](https://github.com/apify/crawlee) (Apify's Node/Python library) is also worth knowing; it covers similar ground to the WebReaper library API but doesn't ship a binary, a Claude Code skill, or a built-in LLM safety net. Use it if you're already in the Apify ecosystem.
The closest reference is Firecrawl: same AI-native positioning, opposite distribution shape. Firecrawl optimises for the hosted-API flow; WebReaper optimises for the local-binary flow. If you want a managed cloud with someone else's proxies and infra, Firecrawl is the buy. If you want a binary that runs locally with your own LLM key and no metering, WebReaper is the build.
## API overview
The library is a fluent builder over a small set of seams. For the deep seam-by-seam reference (interfaces, main entities, custom sinks), see [`docs/architecture.md`](docs/architecture.md).
### Schema extraction
```csharp
using WebReaper.Builders;
var engine = await ScraperEngineBuilder
.Crawl("https://www.alexpavlov.dev/blog")
.Extract(new()
{
new("title", ".text-3xl.font-bold"),
new("text", ".max-w-max.prose.prose-dark")
})
.Follow("a.text-gray-900.transition")
.WriteToJsonFile("output.json")
.PageCrawlLimit(10)
.WithParallelismDegree(30)
.LogToConsole()
.BuildAsync();
await engine.RunAsync();
```
Each `new("field", "css-selector")` is a leaf; nest schemas for objects, set `IsList = true` for arrays, set `Attr = "href"` to read an HTML attribute instead of inner text.
### Collect records in-process
Get the scraped records back in your own process, no file and no custom sink. Pass `Subscribe` (ADR-0038) the `Add` of a thread-safe collection, then read them after the run:
```csharp
using System.Collections.Concurrent;
using WebReaper.Builders;
using WebReaper.Sinks.Models;
var records = new ConcurrentBag<ParsedData>();
var engine = await ScraperEngineBuilder
.Crawl("https://news.ycombinator.com")
.AsMarkdown()
.Subscribe(records.Add) // called concurrently; collect into a thread-safe type
.BuildAsync();
await engine.RunAsync();
foreach (var record in records)
Console.WriteLine($"{record.Url}: {record.Data["markdown"]?.GetValue<string>()?.Length ?? 0} chars");
```
The Crawl driver fans out to sinks concurrently, so a `ConcurrentBag` is the right collector, not a bare `List`. For structured fields, read your schema keys out of `record.Data` instead of `"markdown"`.
### Parsing dynamic pages (SPA)
For JS-rendered pages, swap `Crawl` for `CrawlWithBrowser` and register a browser transport. Two satellites are available.
**[`WebReaper.Playwright`](https://www.nuget.org/packages/WebReaper.Playwright)** is the modern default (ADR-0053): multi-browser, all ten `PageAction` arms.
```csharp
using WebReaper.Builders;
using WebReaper.Playwright;
await ScraperEngineBuilder
.CrawlWithBrowser("https://example.com")
.Extract(new() { new("title", "h1") })
.WithPlaywrightPageLoader()
.BuildAsync();
```
**[`WebReaper.Cdp`](https://www.nuget.org/packages/WebReaper.Cdp)** is the AOT-clean alternative (ADR-0052): raw CDP over System.Net.WebSockets, AOT-publishable. Use for AOT consumers or as the base for stealth backends.
```csharp
using WebReaper.Cdp;
.WithCdpPageLoader(new CdpLaunchOptions { Headless = true })
// or .WithCdpPageLoader(cdpUrl: "http://localhost:9222") for BYO browser
```
For bot-protected sites, layer **[`WebReaper.Stealth.CloakBrowser`](https://www.nuget.org/packages/WebReaper.Stealth.CloakBrowser)** (ADR-0054) on top of `WebReaper.Cdp`:
```csharp
using WebReaper.Stealth.CloakBrowser;
.WithCloakBrowser() // auto-downloads CloakBrowser on first use, ~220 MB
```
For visible-browser debugging, add `.HeadlessMode(false)`.
### Running JavaScript and page actions
Drive the page as it loads. Pass an actions lambda.
```csharp
using WebReaper.Builders;
using WebReaper.Playwright;
using WebReaper.Domain.PageActions;
await ScraperEngineBuilder
.CrawlWithBrowser("https://www.reddit.com/r/dotnet/", actions => actions
.ScrollToEnd()
.Build())
.Extract(new() { new("title", "h1") })
.WithPlaywrightPageLoader()
.BuildAsync();
```
`PageActionBuilder` exposes `Click`, `Wait`, `ScrollToEnd`, `ScrollIntoView`, `WaitForSelector`, `WaitForNetworkIdle`, `EvaluateExpression`, `Fill`, `Press`, `SemanticAct`, `Repeat` / `RepeatWithDelay`, and `Build()`. `Fill(selector, value)` / `Press(key)` / `ScrollIntoView(selector)` (ADR-0074) carry an implicit 30 s auto-wait and use the React-friendly native-setter trick on the CDP transport, so controlled components in React / Vue / Svelte observe the change. `SemanticAct` (ADR-0050) accepts a natural-language intent and resolves it via the registered `IActionResolver` (see [AI features §5](#5-semantic-page-actions)).
### Persist progress locally
Survive `kill -9` and resume across restarts. Two adapters: file-backed (zero deps, in core) and SQLite-backed (durable, opt-in via `WebReaper.Sqlite`).
```csharp
using WebReaper.Builders;
using WebReaper.Sqlite;
await ScraperEngineBuilder
.Crawl("https://example.com")
.Extract(new() { new("name", "h1") })
.Follow(".forumlink>a")
.Paginate("a.torTopic", ".pg")
.WriteToJsonFile("result.json")
.WithSqliteScheduler("crawl/state.db") // resume is a query, not a position file
.TrackVisitedLinksInSqlite("crawl/state.db") // the table is the set
.BuildAsync();
```
Pass `dataCleanupOnStart: true` to any sink, tracker, or scheduler method to wipe its store at start (note: `WriteToJsonFile` defaults this to `true`; the others default to `false`).
### Authorization
If the site needs cookies, call `SetCookies` and fill the container. You perform the login yourself.
```csharp
using System.Net;
using WebReaper.Builders;
await ScraperEngineBuilder
.Crawl("https://example.com/protected")
.Extract(new() { new("name", "h1") })
.SetCookies(cookies =>
{
cookies.Add(new Cookie("AuthToken", "123"));
})
.BuildAsync();
```
### Distributed and serverless
Swap the scheduler, config storage, and link tracker to Redis or Azure Service Bus; multiple workers or serverless functions share one crawl. [`Examples/WebReaper.AzureFuncs`](Examples/WebReaper.AzureFuncs) shows the serverless shape (two functions: `StartScraping` seeds the work, `WebReaperSpider` is the distributed Crawl driver). [`Examples/WebReaper.DistributedScraperWorkerService`](Examples/WebReaper.DistributedScraperWorkerService) shows the worker-service shape.
`DistributedSpiderBuilder.BuildSpider()` returns a bare `ISpider` without a Crawl seed (ADR-0009 / ADR-0025: "two seams, not one bug" split). The worker's config is persisted separately by the start endpoint.
### Storage and scheduler backends
Every backend is a swappable seam. In-memory is the default; file-backed lives in core; the rest come from satellites.
| Seam | Core (in-memory default + file) | Satellite options |
|---|---|---|
| Scheduler | in-memory, `WithTextFileScheduler` | `WithSqliteScheduler`, `WithRedisScheduler`, `WithAzureServiceBusScheduler` |
| Visited-link tracker | in-memory, `TrackVisitedLinksInFile` | `TrackVisitedLinksInSqlite`, `TrackVisitedLinksInRedis` |
| Config storage | in-memory, `WithFileConfigStorage` | `WithMongoDbConfigStorage`, `WithRedisConfigStorage` |
| Cookie storage | in-memory, `WithFileCookieStorage` | `WithMongoDbCookieStorage`, `WithRedisCookieStorage` |
| Agent run store | in-memory, file (ADR-0051) | `WithSqliteAgentRunStore`, `WithRedisAgentRunStore`, `WithMongoAgentRunStore`, `WithCosmosAgentRunStore` |
| Result sink | `WriteToConsole`, `WriteToCsvFile`, `WriteToJsonFile` | `WriteToMongoDb`, `WriteToRedis`, `WriteToCosmosDb` |
| Page loader transport | HTTP (default) | `WithPlaywrightPageLoader`, `WithCdpPageLoader`, `WithCloakBrowser` |
Custom sinks, the full interface index, and the main domain entities live in [`docs/architecture.md`](docs/architecture.md).
## Repository structure
| Project | Description |
|---|---|
| `WebReaper` | The core library (the `WebReaper` NuGet package). |
| `WebReaper.Cdp` | Raw CDP transport satellite (ADR-0052). |
| `WebReaper.Playwright` | Microsoft.Playwright transport satellite (ADR-0053). |
| `WebReaper.Stealth.CloakBrowser` | First stealth-backend satellite (ADR-0054). |
| `WebReaper.AI` | LLM extraction, action resolver, agent brain, self-healing, schema inferrer. |
| `WebReaper.Extraction.Attributes` | `[ScrapeSchema]` / `[ScrapeField]` marker types (ADR-0045). |
| `WebReaper.Extraction.Generators` | Roslyn source generator (ADR-0045). |
| `WebReaper.Mcp` | MCP server satellite (ADR-0049). |
| `WebReaper.Mongo` | MongoDB sink plus config / cookie storage. |
| `WebReaper.Redis` | Redis scheduler, tracker, sink, config / cookie storage. |
| `WebReaper.AzureServiceBus` | Azure Service Bus distributed scheduler. |
| `WebReaper.Cosmos` | Azure Cosmos DB sink. |
| `WebReaper.Sqlite` | Local durable scheduler and visited-link tracker over embedded SQLite. |
| `WebReaper.Cli` | AOT single-binary CLI (ADR-0043). |
| `Examples/WebReaper.ConsoleApplication` | Using WebReaper in a console application. |
| `Examples/WebReaper.AiNativeShowcase` | Runnable demos for every AI feature in this README. |
| `Examples/WebReaper.SchemaInferenceShowcase` | Demos for ADR-0067 / 0068 / 0069 schema inference. |
| `Examples/WebReaper.ScraperWorkerService` | Using WebReaper in a .NET Worker Service. |
| `Examples/WebReaper.DistributedScraperWorkerService` | Distributed crawl across workers sharing crawl state. |
| `Examples/WebReaper.AzureFuncs` | Serverless crawl with Azure Functions plus Azure Service Bus. |
| `Examples/BrownsfashionScraper` | A real-world e-commerce scraper example. |
| `Misc/WebReaper.ProxyProviders` | Example proxy-provider implementations. |
## License
WebReaper is MIT-licensed (ADR-0017). All NuGet packages plus the `WebReaper.Cli` binary ship under the same terms. Use it commercially, embed it in proprietary software, fork it, modify it, redistribute it; the only ask is that you keep the copyright notice.
Prior to the 10.0.0 wave, WebReaper was GPL-3.0-or-later. The relicense is strictly more permissive: every existing user is unaffected; new users who couldn't embed under GPL now can. Historical contributors are credited in [`CONTRIBUTORS.md`](CONTRIBUTORS.md). See [`docs/adr/0017-relicense-gpl-mit.md`](docs/adr/0017-relicense-gpl-mit.md) for the analysis and contributor consent path.
Contributions are welcome under the same MIT terms; sign-off via DCO ([`CONTRIBUTING.md`](CONTRIBUTING.md)).
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