Choose Octoparse for recurring, scheduled collection across many pages, with cloud runs, templates and delivery to other systems. Choose Pulse Extractor when the work is occasional and varied, and you want this page as a workbook, a document or a capture in one click.
Side by side
The Octoparse column restates what Octoparse publishes about itself; each statement links to its source. The Pulse column describes Pulse Extractor 0.5.8, the current Chrome Web Store release.
| Octoparse | Pulse Extractor | |
|---|---|---|
| How you start | Build a task with AI auto-detect, or use a template[1] | Open the page and click Extract Page. No selectors, recipes or robots to build; repeated items are detected whether or not they are a table |
| Where it runs | On your computer or in its cloud, with many runs at once and IP rotation[2] | Extract Page runs in the extension on your device; Smart Snip recognition runs on your computer. One page at a time, when you click. Pulse does not follow next-page buttons, crawl a site or run on a schedule |
| Free plan | 10 tasks and up to 50,000 rows a month, local extraction[3] | 20 Page Extractions, 20 captures, 20 Smart Snips and 10 exports a month |
| Paid plans | Standard from $69 a month (cloud, scheduling); Professional $249 a month[4] | Free plan, no card (20 Full-Page Captures, 20 Smart Snips and 20 Page Extractions a month); Starter $12 a month or $120 a year, Pro $29, Intelligence $59. Lite $6.99 a month or $69 a year |
| Capture, OCR, documents | Not described on its home page[5] | Capture Full Page saves the whole page as one high-resolution PNG or a multi-page PDF (Live in 0.5.8). Smart Snip reads text and tables inside images, on your own computer, in English, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, German, Spanish, French, Portuguese and Italian, with Arabic and Traditional Chinese in Beta; it also opens PNG, JPEG, WebP and PDF files from your computer. Editable Word and PowerPoint replicas with real tables, from a snip or a whole result |
What Octoparse says it does
Teams that build no-code scrapers for recurring, larger jobs and want them to run in the cloud on a schedule.
- A no-code scraper builder with AI auto-detect to draft a workflow, plus templates for popular websites.[1]
- Runs scrapers on your own computer or in its cloud, which can run many scrapers at once and handle IP rotation.[2]
- Its free plan includes 10 tasks and up to 50,000 rows of data export a month, with local extraction.[3]
- Paid plans start at $69 a month (Standard, with cloud extraction and scheduling); Professional is $249 a month.[4]
- Does not describe full-page screenshots, text recognition from images, or Word and PowerPoint export.[5]
Choose Octoparse when
- You need recurring, scheduled collection across many pages
- You want cloud runs, IP rotation and ready-made templates for popular sites
- You need data delivered to databases or other apps automatically
Choose Pulse Extractor when
- You want a result from the page you are viewing in one click, without building a task
- You need capture, text recognition or editable Office output from the same page
- Your work is occasional and varied rather than a recurring pipeline
See what Pulse produced on real public pages, with the original files, in the Proof Lab.
Using both
If the data has to arrive every morning without anyone clicking, that is a platform job. If someone is looking at a page and needs it in Excel or Word now, that is Pulse.
How this comparison was made
We read Octoparse's own public pages and store listing on and restated only what they say, in our own words, with a link to each source. We did not test Octoparse, so its column reports its claims, not our measurements. Products change: check the sources before you decide, and tell us if something here is out of date.
Octoparse is a trademark of its owner. Pulse Extractor is a separate product and is not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to Octoparse.
Questions
Can Pulse schedule scrapes like Octoparse?
No. Pulse works when you click, on the page you are viewing. Octoparse lists scheduling and cloud extraction on its paid plans.
Is Pulse a scraper?
Not in the platform sense. It structures the page you are viewing into a result you can export, and adds capture, text recognition and research. It does not crawl sites.
Which is cheaper?
They price different things. Octoparse lists a free plan and paid plans from $69 a month. Pulse has a Free plan and paid plans from $12 a month.
Sources
- Octoparse: octoparse.com, checked
- Octoparse: octoparse.com, checked
- Octoparse: octoparse.com/pricing, checked
- Octoparse: octoparse.com/pricing, checked
- Octoparse: octoparse.com, checked