TL;DR
- Compares 5 Indeed scrapers — ScraperAPI, Scrapingdog, ZenRows, Bright Data, ScrapingBee using each product’s general scraper.
- Criteria: speed, success rate, support, scalability, dev-friendliness; simple test harness shown.
- Scrapingdog is featured with a free 1k-credit trial to test reliability on Indeed.
- Bottom line: choose based on your success-vs-cost needs at target scale.
If you’re planning to scrape job-listing sites like Indeed (or similar platforms) at scale, choosing the right web scraping API can make a big difference. You’ll typically need:
- Reliable JavaScript rendering (many job portals use dynamic loading)
- Anti-bot & CAPTCHA handling
- Proxy rotation / geo-flexibility
- Predictable costs and data structure output
In this article we compare five major scraping APIs: ScraperAPI, Scrapingdog, ZenRows, Brightdata, and ScrapingBee. The goal is to help you decide which is best for scraping Indeed.com with high reliability and minimal fuss.
Criteria
We are going to compare 3 APIs from each product and then compare them on the basis of:
- Speed
- Success rate
- Support
- Scalability
- Developer friendly
We will use general web scraper of each product to scrape Indeed.
We are going to use this nodejs code to test different products.
import requests
import time
import random
import urllib.parse
# List of search terms
indeed_urls = ['https://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=Software+Engineer&l=New%20York',"https://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=python&l=New+York%2C+NY","https://il.indeed.com/jobs?q=&l=israel&fromage=1&vjk=3e2c3c5a7577fa90","https://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=python&l=New+York%2C+NY","https://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=Assistant+Restaurant+Manager&start=0&l=Chicago%2C+IL"]
# Replace with your actual API endpoint
# Make sure it includes {query} where the search term should be inserted
base_url = "https://api.example.com/"
total_requests = 10
success_count = 0
total_time = 0
for i in range(total_requests):
try:
search_term = random.choice(indeed_urls)
params={ 'api_key': 'e021d6abdf4575687890e10deb3189c8',
'url': search_term}
# url = base_url.format(query=search_term)
start_time = time.time()
response = requests.get(base_url,params=params)
end_time = time.time()
request_time = end_time - start_time
total_time += request_time
if response.status_code == 200:
success_count += 1
print(f"Request {i+1}: '{search_term}' took {request_time:.2f}s | Status: {response.status_code}")
except Exception as e:
print(f"Request {i+1} with '{search_term}' failed due to: {str(e)}")
# Final Stats
average_time = total_time / total_requests
success_rate = (success_count / total_requests) * 100
print(f"\n🔍 Total Requests: {total_requests}")
print(f"✅ Successful: {success_count}")
print(f"⏱️ Average Time: {average_time:.2f} seconds")
print(f"📊 Success Rate: {success_rate:.2f}%")
Scrapingdog
Scrapingdog provides powerful web scrapers to scrape websites with CAPTCHA and bot protection.
- You get 1000 free credits when you signup for the free pack.
- To scrape Indeed, you’ll need to enable Stealth Mode. Pricing begins at roughly $0.002 per request and can go as low as $0.000583 on larger plans.
- Documentation is pretty clear and API can be integrated easily with any system.
- Support is available 24*7through chat and email.
Testing Indeed
Summary
- Scrapingdog scraped indeed with 100% success rate with an average response time of 14.47 seconds.
Scraperapi
Scraperapi provides web scraping api to scrape any website. The scraper will respond with the html data of the target website.
- On new sign up you get free 5000 credits to test the API.
- Each successful response will cost you around $0.0049 but the pricing drops to $0.00095 on their biggest pack.
- The documentation is very clear and you can easily integrate their APIs in your system.
- Customer support is only available through email. No instant chat support is available.
Testing Indeed
Summary
- Scraperapi scraped indeed at an average response time of 50.43 seconds with 50% success rate.
Zenrows
Zenrows is another web scraping API in the market which offers general scraper for scraping websites.
- On signup you get 1000 credits which remains active until the next 14 days.
- Every request to indeed.com will cost you $0.025 and it goes down with bigger packs.
- Dashboard is a little confusing to operate but documentation is clear and the API can be integrated easily.
- Instant customer support through chat and email is available.
Testing Indeed
Summary
- We got 100% success rate with Zenrows with 22.23 seconds as average response time.
Brightdata
This is one of the pioneer company in the scraping industry. They provide powerful scrapers and proxies to scrape websites.
- You have to go through their KYC process in order to test the APIs and proxies.
- You have to use their web unblocker to scrape indeed at scale.
- Pricing starts from $0.0015 and drops to $0.001.
- You can easily integrate their proxies in your system.
- Support is available 24*7 and literally waiting for your query.
Testing Indeed
Summary
- We got 100% success rate with Brightdata with an average response time of 6.36 seconds.
Scrapingbee
Scrapingbee also provides a general scraper to scrape websites at scale. Using their extract rule feature you can extract parsed JSON data from raw html data.
- On signup you get free 1000 credits to test the API.
- You’ll need to use their Stealth Proxy mode to scrape Indeed. The pricing starts at $0.0147 per request and drops to $0.00562 on their largest available plan.
- APIs can be easily integrated in any working environment.
- Support is available 24*7 through chat and email.
Testing Indeed
Summary
- We got 98% success rate with an average response time of 15.88 seconds.
Price Comparison
When it comes to pricing, Scrapingdog clearly leads the pack, offering one of the lowest per-request costs in the industry, especially at scale.
While Bright Data remains competitive on volume, most other providers like ScraperAPI, ZenRows, and ScrapingBee are considerably more expensive for large-scale scraping operations.
If your use case involves frequent or high-volume scraping (like tracking Indeed job listings), Scrapingdog delivers the best balance between cost efficiency and scalability.
Speed Comparison
When it comes to speed, Bright Data tops the chart with an impressive 6.36-second average response time, followed by Scrapingdog at 14.47 seconds, maintaining strong performance even under consistent 100% success.
In terms of reliability, Scrapingdog, ZenRows, and Bright Data all achieved perfect 100% success rates, while ScrapingBee performed well at 98%, and ScraperAPI lagged behind with only 50% reliability.
Final Verdict
All five providers delivered usable results, but their performance varied across speed and consistency. Bright Data was the fastest in response time, while Scrapingdog, ZenRows, and Bright Data maintained perfect success rates. ScrapingBee also performed reliably with only a slight dip in success, and ScraperAPI showed room for improvement in stability.
Ultimately, the best choice depends on your specific needs. Whether that’s speed, scalability, or cost efficiency. Each provider has its strengths, and the right fit comes down to balancing performance with your project’s priorities.
