ScrapeNinja vs ZenRows (2026): which should you pick?

Pick ScrapeNinja if

• Fits if you scrape sites that block simple requests and are comfortable writing JavaScript
• Works for people who want to test cheaply before paying

Look elsewhere if

• Not for you if you want a no-code scraper, since you write extractors yourself
• Tight if you stay free: 100 requests a month
• Watch out: a JavaScript-browser request counts as 7 points, so a plan covers a seventh as many
• Watch out: there is no pricing page on its own site, so you buy through a marketplace

Pick ZenRows if

• Fits if you scrape protected sites and want Google results from the same credits
• Works for AI agents that need web pages as Markdown or JSON

Look elsewhere if

• Skip it if you want a fixed SERP format, as the result groups vary with what Google or Bing shows
• Watch out: a page costs 1 credit plain, 5 rendered, 10 on premium proxies and 25 with both
• Watch out: residential bandwidth draws 25,000 credits per GB and the Browser 5 credits a minute
• Tight if you're on Free, which stops at 5,000 credits with no top-ups until the next month
• Pricey if your volume grows, as each plan's price steps up with its credit allowance

ScrapeNinja

• Plans are bought on the APIRoad marketplace, and ScrapeNinja's own site has no pricing page of its own.
• Browser-engine requests cost 7 billing points each, so a plan covers about one seventh as many /scrape-js calls.
• The Basic plan has only 100 requests a month, which is enough for testing only.
• It is a general scraping API; there is no dedicated SERP endpoint or SEO metrics on the site.

ZenRows

• A standard page costs 1 credit, 5 with JavaScript rendering, 10 with premium proxies and 25 with both; residential bandwidth is 25,000 credits per GB.
• Search results come from fetching a Google or Bing results address and parsing the page, so the groups returned vary with what the page shows.
• The free plan stops at 5,000 credits until the next month; paid plans can buy top-ups up to ten times a billing period.
• Each paid plan's price rises with its credit allowance, in three steps (five for Scale).

ScrapeNinja

Chrome fingerprint emulation

Sends requests that emulate a real Chrome browser without running Puppeteer, to avoid blocks based on TLS fingerprints.

Two network engines

Switch between raw network requests for speed and a headless browser with JavaScript evaluation for pages that need it.

Rotating proxies and retries

Rotating datacenter proxies in the US, EU, Germany, France and Brazil, with retries based on timeouts, status codes and page text.

JavaScript extractors

Short JS snippets pull JSON out of HTML, and an online builder and Cheerio playground help write and test them.

Premium proxies

Premium datacenter proxies cost from $1.50 per GB and come with a 50MB gift package for each customer.

ZenRows

Fetch

Returns any page as HTML, Markdown, JSON or a screenshot, getting past anti-bot walls, CAPTCHAs and fingerprint checks on protected sites.

Extract

Detects the data on a page and returns it as JSON with no selectors or schema to write. It currently costs nothing on top of the Fetch it uses.

Search results as JSON

Send a Google or Bing results address with a country and get organic results, related questions, videos and other groups back with their positions.

Crawl and Batch

Crawl collects every page behind a starting address, each billed as a Fetch; Batch runs large queued jobs with retries, webhooks and status tracking.

Browser

Drives a real browser for pages that need clicks, forms, logins or a session kept across a long job, billed at 5 credits a minute plus bandwidth.

MCP server, CLI and SDKs

An MCP server for Claude, Cursor and Codex, a command-line tool, and Python, Node and Go SDKs, all published as open source under MIT.

ScrapeNinja

• Basic$0

  100 requests per month.

• Pro$25

  per month for 100,000 requests

  100,000 basic requests per month.

• Ultra$75

  per month for 500,000 requests

  500,000 basic requests per month.

• Mega$150

  per month for 1,500,000 requests

  1,500,000 basic requests per month.

ZenRows

• Free$0

  5,000 credits a month, refreshed monthly with no rollover or top-ups, 5 concurrent requests and community support.

• Build$16

  per month for 45,000 credits, billed annually ($19 billed monthly)

  20 concurrent requests, email support and top-ups. Rises to $33 a month for 120,000 credits ($39 billed monthly).

• Launch$58

  per month for 250,000 credits, billed annually ($69 billed monthly)

  50 concurrent requests and chat support. Rises to $108 a month for 700,000 credits ($129 billed monthly).

• Growth$166

  per month for 1.2M credits, billed annually ($199 billed monthly)

  100 concurrent requests, priority support and the residential network at scale. Rises to $333 a month for 3M credits ($399 monthly).

• Scale$458

  per month for 5M credits, billed annually ($549 billed monthly)

  200 to 400 concurrent requests and committed capacity options. Rises to $2,499 a month for 45M credits ($2,999 monthly).

• EnterpriseCustom

  Committed volume, 500 to 1,000+ concurrent requests, an SLA, a DPA and a dedicated account manager. Through sales.

ScrapeNinja

No public discounts listed.

ZenRows

• Annual discount

  Two months free with annual billing

  Zenrows says paying yearly gives two months free (pay for 10, get 12), shown as a 17% saving, with the year's credits up front.