7 Most useful tools to scrape data from Amazon
Tags: Web Scraping, Data Analysis

This article gives you an idea of what web scraping tool you should use to scrape from Amazon. The list includes small-scale extension tools and multi-functional web scraping softwares and they are compared in three dimensions:

the degree of automation

how friendly the user interface is

how much can be used freely

The key to an extension is easy to reach. You can get the idea of web scraping rapidly. With rather basic functions, these options are fit for casual scraping or small business in need of information in simple structure and small amounts.

Browser Extensions

The key to an extension is easy to reach. You can get the idea of web scraping rapidly. With rather basic functions, these options are fit for casual scraping or small business in need of information in simple structure and small amounts.

Data Miner

Data miner is an extension tool that works on Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge. It helps you scrape data from web pages into a CSV file or Excel spreadsheet. A number of custom recipes are available for scraping amazon data. If those offered are exactly what you need, this could be a handy tool for you to scrape from Amazon within a few clicks.

Data scraped by Data Miner

Data Miner has a step-by-step friendly interface and basic functions in web scraping. It’s more recommendable for small business or casual use.

There is a page limit (500/month) for the free plan with Data Miner. If you need to scrape more, professional and other paid plans are available.

Web Scraper

Web Scraper is an extension tool with a point and click interface integrated in the developer tool. Without certain templates for e-commerce or Amazon scraping, you have to build your own crawler by selecting the listing information you want on the web page.

UI integrated in the developer tool

Web scraper is equipped with functions (available for paid plan) such as cloud extraction, scheduled scraping, IP rotation, API access. Thus it is capable of more frequent scraping and scraping of a larger volume of information.

Scraper Parsers

Scraper Parsers is a browser extension tool to extract unstructured data and visualize without code. Data extracted can be viewed on the site or downloaded in various forms (XLSX, XLS, XML, CSV). With data extracted, numbers can be displayed in charts accordingly.

Small draggable Panel

The UI of Parsers is a panel you can drag around and select by clicks on the browser and it also supports scheduled scraping. However it seems not stable enough and easily gets stuck. For a visitor, the limit of use is 600 pages per site. You can get 590 more if you sign up.

Amazon Scraper — Trial Version

Amazon scraper is approachable on Chrome’s extension store. It can help scrape price, shipping cost, product header, product information, product images, ASIN from the Amazon search page.

Right-click and scrape

Go to Amazon website and search. When you are on the search page with results you want to scrape from, right click and choose the “Scrap Asin From This Page” option. Information will be extracted and save it as a CSV file.

This trial version can only download 2 pages of any search query. You need to buy the full version to download unlimited pages and get 1 year free support.

Scraping Software

If you need to scrape from Amazon regularly, you may find some annoying problems that prevent you from reaching the data — IP ban, captcha, login wall, pagination, data in different structures etc. In order to solve these problems, you need a more powerful tool.

Octoparse

Octoparse is a free for life web scraping tool. It helps users to quickly scrape web data without coding. Compared with others, the highlight of this product is its graphic, intuitive UI design. Worth mentioning, its auto-detection function can save your efforts of perplexedly clicking around with messed up data results.

Besides auto-detection, amazon templates are even more convenient. Using templates, you can obtain the product list information as well as detail page information on Amazon. You can also create a more customized crawler by yourself under the advanced mode.

Plenty of templates available for use on Octoparse

There is no limit for the amount of data scraped even with a free plan as long as you keep your data within 10,000 rows per task.

Amazon data scraped using Octoparse

Powerful functions such as cloud service, scheduled automatic scraping, IP rotation (to prevent IP ban) are offered in a paid plan. If you want to monitor stock numbers, prices and other information about an array of shops/products at a regular basis, they are definitely helpful.

ScrapeStorm

ScrapeStorm is an AI-powered visual web scraping tool. Its smart mode works similar to the auto-detection in Octoparse, intelligently identifying the data with little manual operation required. So you just need to click and enter the URL of the amazon page you want to scrape from.

Its Pre Login function helps you scrape URLs that require login to view content. Generally speaking, the UI design of the app is like a browser and comfortable to use.

Data scraped using ScrapeStorm

ScrapeStorm offers a free quota of 100 rows of data per day and one concurrent run is allowed. The value of data comes as you have enough of them for analysis, so you should think of upgrading your service if you choose this tool. Upgrade to the professional so that you can get 10,000 rows per day.

ParseHub

ParseHub is another free web scraper available for direct download. As most of the scraping tools above, it supports crawler building in a click-and-select way and export of data into structured spreadsheets.

For Amazon scrapers, Parsehub doesn’t support auto-detection or offer any Amazon templates, however, if you have prior experience using a scraping tool to build customized crawlers, you can take a shot on this.

Build your crawler on Parsehub

You can save images and files to DropBox, run with IP rotation and scheduling if you start from a standard plan. Free plan users will get 200 pages per run. Don’t forget to backup your data (14-day data retention).

Something More than Tools

Tools are created for convenience use. They make complicated operations possible through a few clicks on a bunch of buttons.

However, it is also common for users to counter unexpected errors because the situation is ever-changing on different sites. You can step a little bit deeper to rescue yourself from such a dilemma — learn a bit about html and Xpath. Not so far to become a coder, just a few steps to know the tool better.

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