How to Use Botasaurus for Web Scraping: A Complete Guide

In this article, I’ll show you how to set up Botasaurus, use its features, and avoid common issues you might run into. Whether you’re new to web scraping or looking for a more effective way to bypass anti-bot measures, this guide will walk you through everything you need to know. Let’s get started!

What is Botasaurus?

Botasaurus is a Python library designed for web scraping that focuses on bypassing anti-bot systems. Unlike traditional scraping methods, Botasaurus uses real browser automation, making it effective at scraping dynamic websites that rely on JavaScript. One of its key features is the ability to evade detection by anti-bot systems, such as Cloudflare, which is commonly used by websites to block unwanted scraping activity.

Botasaurus integrates with tools like Selenium and Requests to provide a comprehensive scraping solution. It offers simple configuration options that allow you to authenticate with proxies, use Chrome extensions, and route requests through Google to mimic legitimate user behavior. This makes it a great tool for scraping websites that actively try to block scrapers.

Why Should You Use Botasaurus?

If you’ve been struggling with scraping websites that block your scrapers after a few requests, Botasaurus can offer several advantages:

1. Anti-Detection Features: Botasaurus integrates with Selenium WebDriver and uses advanced techniques to hide your scraping activities, making it difficult for websites to detect your automated bot.
2. Real Browser Automation: Since it works with real browsers, Botasaurus is particularly effective for dynamic websites that rely heavily on JavaScript for rendering content.
3. Automatic ChromeDriver Setup: Unlike some scraping tools that require installing and managing ChromeDriver manually, Botasaurus handles this automatically during its first build, making the setup process easier.
4. Proxy Support: Botasaurus allows you to route requests through proxies, helping to avoid IP bans and rate limiting. Check out my list of the best rotating IP providers.
5. Google Routing: Botasaurus can route requests through Google, further mimicking legitimate browsing activity and making it harder for anti-bot systems to detect your requests.

Looking for a More Scalable Alternative?

While Botasaurus is great for local scraping and bypassing basic anti-bot measures, it can struggle with advanced fingerprinting, remote deployment, and maintaining reliability at scale. If you’re running into these limitations, consider using Bright Data’s Web Unlocker.

Web Unlocker is a fully managed solution that handles IP rotation, browser fingerprinting, CAPTCHA solving, and dynamic content rendering — automatically. It’s ideal for scraping protected websites without the need to manage headless browsers or build evasion logic from scratch.

Whether you’re scraping at scale or just want a more stable alternative to local browser automation, Web Unlocker can save you time and reduce failure rates.

Now, let’s get started with setting up and using Botasaurus for web scraping.

Prerequisites

Before we dive into the code, you will need the following:

1. Python 3.12.1 or higher: Botasaurus requires Python to run, so ensure you have the latest version installed on your machine. You can download it from the official Python website.
2. Botasaurus Library: You will need to install Botasaurus, which can be easily done via pip (Python’s package installer).

Installing Botasaurus

To install Botasaurus, open a terminal or command prompt and run the following command:

pip install botasaurus

Once the installation is complete, you are ready to start scraping.

Setting Up Your First Scraper with Botasaurus

Let’s create a simple scraper that extracts data from a website. For this tutorial, we’ll scrape OpenSea, an NFT marketplace, and extract the HTML of the homepage. Here’s how to get started:

Step 1: Create a New Project

First, create a new folder for your project. Inside this folder, create a file named scraper.py. This will be the file where you write your scraping code.

Step 2: Import Botasaurus

At the beginning of the scraper.py file, import the Botasaurus module:

from botasaurus import *

Step 3: Write the Scraper Function

Define a function to perform the scraping. Botasaurus uses decorators like @browser to define a scraping function. The driver parameter is the automation driver that interacts with the browser, while the data parameter holds any data you want to pass to the function.

Here’s a basic scraper function that navigates to OpenSea’s homepage:

@browser
def scraper(driver: AntiDetectDriver, data: dict):
# Navigate to the target website
driver.google_get("https://opensea.io")
# Retrieve the HTML content
content = driver.text("html")
# Print the HTML content to the console
print(content)
# Return the content as a dictionary
return {"content": content}

In the function above:

• driver.google_get(“https://opensea.io”) tells the Botasaurus driver to open the OpenSea homepage.
• driver.text(“html”) retrieves the HTML content of the page.
• The content is printed to the console and returned as a dictionary for further use.

Step 4: Run the Scraper

To execute the scraper, call the scraper() function at the end of the file:

scraper()

When you run the script for the first time, Botasaurus will automatically install ChromeDriver and set up any necessary dependencies. This can take a few minutes, so be patient.

Once the setup is complete, the scraper will visit OpenSea and print the HTML content of the homepage to the console.

Adding a Proxy to Avoid IP Bans

Websites often block scrapers that send too many requests from the same IP address. To avoid this, you can use proxies to route your requests through different IP addresses. Botasaurus makes it easy to configure proxies for your scraper.

Here’s how to add a proxy to the scraper:

Step 1: Specify the Proxy

You can add a proxy to your scraper by including the proxy argument in the @browser decorator. For example:

@browser(proxy="http://185.217.136.67:1337")
def scraper(driver: AntiDetectDriver, data: dict):
# Your scraping code here

This specifies that all requests will go through the proxy server at 185.217.136.67:1337. You can replace this with a proxy of your choice.

Step 2: Test the Proxy

To confirm that the proxy is working, you can use a service like httpbin to check your current IP address. Update your scraper to visit httpbin and print the response:

@browser(proxy="http://185.217.136.67:1337")
def scraper(driver: AntiDetectDriver, data: dict):
driver.get("https://httpbin.org/ip")
ip_address = driver.text("body")
print(ip_address)

This will print the IP address that your scraper is using. If everything is set up correctly, you should see a different IP address than your original one, confirming that the proxy is working.

Advanced Features of Botasaurus

Botasaurus has several advanced features to help you scrape more efficiently and evade detection. Here are some of the most useful features:

1. Dynamic User-Agent Switching

One way to make your scraper harder to detect is by rotating the User-Agent header. Botasaurus can automatically switch between different User-Agent strings to make your requests look like they’re coming from different browsers and devices. This helps you avoid detection by anti-bot systems that look for suspicious patterns in headers.

2. Bypassing Cloudflare Protection

Cloudflare is a popular anti-bot service that many websites use. Botasaurus includes special functionality to bypass Cloudflare’s protection. You can use the driver.google_get() method to route your requests through Google, which makes it harder for Cloudflare to detect automated activity.

3. Parallel Scraping

For larger scraping tasks, you can scrape multiple pages simultaneously. Botasaurus supports parallel scraping with minimal configuration. This can significantly speed up the data extraction process.

4. Use of Chrome Extensions

Botasaurus allows you to install any Chrome extension in your browser instance. If you need specific functionality during scraping, such as blocking pop-ups or running custom scripts, you can add the extension URL in the @browser decorator.

@browser(extension="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/extension-id")
def scraper(driver: AntiDetectDriver, data: dict):
# Your scraping code here

5. Debugging Support

If you run into issues while scraping, Botasaurus provides debugging support. You can pause the browser instance to check what went wrong. This is particularly useful when dealing with dynamic websites that use JavaScript.

Limitations of Botasaurus

While Botasaurus is a powerful tool, it does have some limitations:

1. Limited Advanced Fingerprint Management: Botasaurus does not fully address advanced fingerprinting techniques. Even though it dynamically changes the User-Agent and hides the IP address, some websites may still detect your bot based on subtle differences in the browser environment.
2. Not Ideal for Remote Servers: Botasaurus works best in a local development environment. It may not perform as well on remote servers, such as AWS, where access to the browser APIs is restricted.
3. Dependency on External Sites for Evasion: Sometimes, Botasaurus needs to route requests through external websites like Google. This can be unreliable if the external site changes its security measures.

Conclusion

So, we’ve explored how to use Botasaurus for web scraping. This library offers a simple and effective way to bypass anti-bot measures and scrape data from websites that use dynamic JavaScript and advanced protections.

We also discussed how to set up Botasaurus, use proxy support, and take advantage of its advanced features, such as stealth mode and parallel scraping.

However, Botasaurus does have limitations, such as advanced browser fingerprinting and reliance on external sites for evasion. Using Botasaurus and following best practices, you can build powerful web scrapers that bypass anti-bot protections and extract the data you need.