What are the best Python libraries for web scraping?

Python offers several powerful libraries for web scraping, each with different strengths.

Requests + BeautifulSoup (most common):

• requests handles HTTP requests and session management
• BeautifulSoup parses HTML and provides easy element selection
• Best for: Static websites, APIs, simple to moderate scraping tasks
• Lightweight and fast with minimal overhead

Scrapy (production scraping):

• Full-featured framework for large-scale scraping
• Built-in crawling, data pipelines, and concurrent requests
• Best for: Complex projects, crawling entire sites, production deployments
• Steeper learning curve but more powerful

Selenium (JavaScript-heavy sites):

• Controls a real browser to handle JavaScript rendering
• Best for: SPAs, sites requiring interaction (clicks, form fills, scrolling)
• Slower than other options due to browser overhead
• Use when HTML isn't available without JavaScript

Playwright/Puppeteer (modern alternative):

• Modern browser automation with better performance than Selenium
• Better handling of modern web technologies
• Best for: JavaScript-heavy sites, screenshot capture, complex interactions

lxml (performance-critical parsing):

• Fastest HTML/XML parser for Python
• Supports both XPath and CSS selectors
• Best for: Large documents, performance-sensitive tasks

Recommendation:

Start with Requests + BeautifulSoup for most projects. Move to Scrapy when scaling up, or use Selenium/Playwright when JavaScript rendering is required.