crawl4ai vs firecrawl
Updated
Both are free, open-source tools for turning websites into LLM-ready data. firecrawl is more popular (195k vs 86k GitHub stars). Pick crawl4ai if you're building a commercial product (Apache-2.0 allows it; firecrawl is copyleft); pick firecrawl if you want the bigger community (195k vs 86k GitHub stars).
Side by side
 crawl4ai |  firecrawl | |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Coding assistants | Agents & automation |
| GitHub stars | 86,261 | 195,329 |
| Stars this week | +196 | +2,035 |
| Last update | 3d ago | today |
| License | Apache-2.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Commercial use | Copyleft | |
| Language | Python | TypeScript |
| Runs on Mac | ||
| Runs without a GPU | ||
| GPU memory | Not stated | Not stated |
| Needs a paid API key | No | Yes |
| Self-hostable | ||
| Trending this week | – | – |
Hardware details are as stated by each project and may be incomplete.
Choose crawl4ai if…
Converts websites into LLM-ready Markdown for AI agents and data pipelines.
- you're building a commercial product (Apache-2.0 allows it; firecrawl is copyleft)
- you don't have a GPU
- you don't want to pay for an API key
- your team works in Python
Choose firecrawl if…
Supercharge your AI agents with data from the web and beyond. Building the library for superintelligence. 🔥
- you want the bigger community (195k vs 86k GitHub stars)
- you want the one with more momentum right now (+2.0k stars this week)
- your team works in TypeScript
FAQ
Is crawl4ai better than firecrawl?
Both are free, open-source tools for turning websites into LLM-ready data. firecrawl is more popular (195k vs 86k GitHub stars). Pick crawl4ai if you're building a commercial product (Apache-2.0 allows it; firecrawl is copyleft); pick firecrawl if you want the bigger community (195k vs 86k GitHub stars).
Which is better for commercial use, crawl4ai or firecrawl?
crawl4ai (Apache-2.0) allows commercial use with few conditions. firecrawl is copyleft, so check its terms first.
Do crawl4ai and firecrawl run on a Mac?
Neither project states Mac support. Check their install guides before you start.
Are crawl4ai and firecrawl free?
Yes. Both are open source and free to use. Note: firecrawl needs a paid API key from another provider.