Firecrawl is a strong web scraping tool. SnapAPI does everything Firecrawl does — plus screenshots, PDF generation, OG image rendering, and video recording. One API key for the whole stack.
SnapAPI
Every capability that matters for web data extraction, visual capture, and LLM pipelines.
| Feature | SnapAPI Recommended | Firecrawl |
|---|---|---|
| Web scraping — structured JSONExtract page data as JSON | ✓ | ✓ |
| Content extraction — MarkdownClean text for LLM context windows | ✓ | ✓ |
| Screenshot capturePNG, JPEG, WebP, AVIF | ✓ | ✗ Not available |
| Full-page screenshots | ✓ | ✗ |
| PDF generationURL or raw HTML to PDF | ✓ | ✗ Not available |
| OG image generationRender HTML templates to images | ✓ | ✗ |
| Video recordingFull browser session capture | ✓ | ✗ |
| JavaScript rendering | ✓ | ✓ |
| Anti-bot / stealth mode | ✓ | ✓ |
| Custom headers & cookies | ✓ | ✓ |
| Swift SDK (iOS / macOS) | ✓ | ✗ |
| Kotlin SDK (Android / JVM) | ✓ | ✗ |
| JavaScript / Python / Go SDKs | ✓ | ✓ |
| PHP SDK | ✓ | ✗ |
| Permanent free tier | ✓ 200 req/mo, no card | ~ Limited free tier |
| Starter price | ✓ $19/month | $16/mo (scrape credits only) |
| Bulk crawl / sitemap support | ~ Via queue | ✓ Native crawl mode |
| S3 / cloud storage upload | ✓ | ~ |
SnapAPI covers both scraping and visual capture use cases in a single subscription. No need for separate tools.
Prices as of March 2026. Visit each vendor for current rates.
Firecrawl extracts text. SnapAPI extracts text and captures screenshots. If your workflow requires both — visual QA, monitoring, archival, or SaaS features that export PDFs — SnapAPI is the only choice that does not require a second vendor.
Report generation, invoice rendering, document export — these require a PDF API, not just a scraper. SnapAPI's /v1/pdf endpoint renders any URL or raw HTML to a production-quality PDF. Firecrawl cannot do this at all.
If you generate dynamic Open Graph images for blog posts, products, or user profiles, SnapAPI handles this with the same API key you use for scraping. Firecrawl offers no equivalent.
SnapAPI ships official Swift and Kotlin SDKs. If your app needs to capture screenshots of URLs or extract content on device, SnapAPI has first-class mobile support. Firecrawl does not offer Swift or Kotlin SDKs.
SnapAPI's video recording endpoint captures full browser sessions — useful for QA automation, user journey documentation, and visual regression testing. Firecrawl does not offer video recording.
SnapAPI ships an official PHP SDK. Firecrawl does not. PHP teams using Laravel, Symfony, or WordPress can integrate without writing a raw HTTP client from scratch.
Use SnapAPI exactly as you would Firecrawl for extraction — then use the same key for screenshots, PDFs, and video.
# Extract Markdown (same as Firecrawl's core use case)
curl -G "https://api.snapapi.pics/v1/extract" \
--data-urlencode "url=https://example.com" \
-H "X-Api-Key: YOUR_KEY"
# Scrape structured JSON (same as Firecrawl's core use case)
curl -G "https://api.snapapi.pics/v1/scrape" \
--data-urlencode "url=https://example.com" \
-H "X-Api-Key: YOUR_KEY"
# Screenshot — same key, not possible with Firecrawl
curl -G "https://api.snapapi.pics/v1/screenshot" \
--data-urlencode "url=https://example.com" \
-H "X-Api-Key: YOUR_KEY" \
--output screenshot.png
# PDF generation — same key, not possible with Firecrawl
curl -G "https://api.snapapi.pics/v1/pdf" \
--data-urlencode "url=https://example.com" \
-H "X-Api-Key: YOUR_KEY" \
--output page.pdfNo. Firecrawl is focused on scraping and content extraction. It does not capture screenshots, generate PDFs, produce OG images, or record video. SnapAPI provides all of these alongside the same extraction capabilities.
Yes. SnapAPI's /v1/extract endpoint returns clean Markdown from any URL — stripped of navigation boilerplate, with tables and links preserved. It is designed for RAG pipelines, AI assistants, and LLM document ingestion, equivalent to Firecrawl's core extraction capability.
Yes. The extraction and scraping API patterns are similar. Replace the base URL, swap your key, and adjust the field names to match SnapAPI's schema. The free tier (no credit card) lets you validate your integration before committing.
SnapAPI processes pages individually via its queue infrastructure. For bulk crawling at scale, you queue multiple requests via the BullMQ-backed queue. Firecrawl has a more native "crawl a whole site" mode that SnapAPI does not replicate exactly in a single API call.
If you exclusively need bulk site crawling and have no interest in screenshots, PDFs, or visual capture, Firecrawl's native crawl mode may suit that narrow use case. If you need scraping plus any visual output — or plan to add them later — SnapAPI covers everything under one key and one bill.
200 requests/month free, forever. Scrape, extract, screenshot, and generate PDFs — all from the same API key.
Get your free API key →