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playwrightvsrod

python browser-automation
go browser-automation
Apache-2.0 82 5 14,506
53.2 million (month) Feb 24 2021 1.58.0(2026-01-30 15:09:24 ago)
6,853 3 202 MIT
Sep 23 2022 v0.116.2(2024-07-12 11:52:28 ago)

playwright is a Python package that allows developers to automate web browsers for end-to-end testing, web scraping, and web performance analysis. It is built on top of WebKit, Mozilla's Gecko, and Microsoft's EdgeHTML, and it is designed to be fast, reliable, and easy to use.

playwright is similar to Selenium, but it provides a more modern and powerful API, with features such as automatic waiting for elements, automatic retries, and built-in support for browser contexts, which allow you to open multiple pages in a single browser instance.

Playwright also provides an asynchronous client which makes scaling playwright-powered web scrapers easier than alternatives (like Selenium)

Rod is a high-level Go library for browser automation built on the Chrome DevTools Protocol (CDP). It provides a simpler and more intuitive API compared to chromedp, making it easier to write browser automation and web scraping scripts in Go.

Key features include:

  • Simple API Rod's API is designed to be intuitive and requires less boilerplate than chromedp. Common operations like clicking, typing, and waiting are straightforward single-line calls.
  • Auto-wait Automatically waits for elements to be ready before interacting with them, reducing the need for explicit wait statements and making scripts more reliable.
  • Page pool Built-in page pool for managing multiple browser pages efficiently, useful for concurrent scraping tasks.
  • Stealth mode Includes a stealth plugin (rod/lib/launcher/flags) that can disable common automation detection vectors.
  • Element screenshots Can take screenshots of specific elements, not just full pages.
  • Network interception Supports hijacking network requests and responses for modification or monitoring.
  • Input emulation Realistic mouse and keyboard input emulation for interacting with complex web applications.

Rod is the recommended choice for new Go browser automation projects due to its simpler API and active maintenance. It is comparable to Playwright in terms of developer experience but native to the Go ecosystem.

Highlights

cdpfast

Example Use

```python from playwright import sync_playwright # Start Playwright with sync_playwright() as playwright: # Launch a browser instance browser = playwright.chromium.launch() # Open a new context (tab) context = browser.new_context() # Create a new page in the context page = context.new_page() # Navigate to a website page.goto("https://www.example.com") # Find an element by its id element = page.get_by_id("example-id") # Interact with the element element.click() # Fill an input form page.get_by_name("example-name").fill("example text") # Find and click a button page.get_by_xpath("//button[text()='Search']").click() # Wait for the page to load page.wait_for_selector("#results") # Get the page title print(page.title) # Close the browser browser.close() ```
```go package main import ( "fmt" "github.com/go-rod/rod" "github.com/go-rod/rod/lib/launcher" ) func main() { // Launch browser url := launcher.New().Headless(true).MustLaunch() browser := rod.New().ControlURL(url).MustConnect() defer browser.MustClose() // Navigate and auto-wait for the page to load page := browser.MustPage("https://example.com") page.MustWaitStable() // Find elements and extract text - auto-waits for element title := page.MustElement("h1").MustText() fmt.Println("Title:", title) // Fill in a form page.MustElement("input[name='search']").MustInput("web scraping") page.MustElement("button[type='submit']").MustClick() // Wait for results and extract page.MustWaitStable() results := page.MustElements(".result-item") for _, el := range results { text := el.MustText() href := el.MustElement("a").MustProperty("href").String() fmt.Printf("Result: %s (%s)\n", text, href) } // Take screenshot of specific element page.MustElement(".results").MustScreenshot("results.png") } ```

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