head to head · open source
EasySpider vs pinchtab
EasySpider has 44,765 GitHub stars, 5,392 forks, 271 open issues and last shipped yesterday. pinchtab has 10,539 stars, 789 forks, 4 open issues and last shipped 7 days ago. EasySpider leads on adoption by 325% (44,765 vs 10,539 stars). EasySpider is written in JavaScript under AGPL-3.0; pinchtab is written in Go under MIT. EasySpider has attracted 12% as many forks as stars, pinchtab 7%. EasySpider was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| EasySpider | pinchtab | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 45K | ★ 11K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | JavaScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-27 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.4K | ⑂ 789 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick EasySpider if
- You weight community size — 45K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick pinchtab if
- You want the pinchtab feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and pinchtab fits your workflow better
About EasySpider
易采集/EasySpider: Visual Code Free Web Crawler 一个 完全免费 （ 包括商业使用和二次开发 ）的可视化浏览器自动化测试/数据采集/爬虫软件，可以使用图形化界面，无代码可视化的设计和执行任务。只需要在网页上选择自己想要操作的内容并根据提示框操作即可完成任务的设计和执行。同时软件还可以单独以命令行的方式进行执行，从而可以很方便的嵌入到其他系统中。 A completely free (including for commercial use and secondary development) visual browser automation test/data collection/crawler software, which can be used to design and execute tasks in a code free visual way. You only need to select the content you want to operate on the web page and follow the prompts to complete the design and execution of the task. At the same time, the software can also be executed separately in…
read the full EasySpider overview →
About pinchtab
PinchTab Browser control for AI agents Small Go binary • HTTP API • Token efficient What is PinchTab? PinchTab is a standalone HTTP server that gives AI agents direct control over Chrome. For day to day local use, the server is typically installed as a user level daemon, allowing agent tools to reuse the same browser control plane running in the background. This installs the control plane server and starts a default headless Chrome instance, ready to accept requests from agents or manual API calls. PinchTab is designed first for local, single user control on a machine you manage. Remote and distributed layouts…
read the full pinchtab overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is EasySpider or pinchtab more popular?
EasySpider has 44,765 GitHub stars and pinchtab has 10,539. EasySpider has the larger community by that measure.
Are EasySpider and pinchtab free?
Both are open source. EasySpider is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and pinchtab under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between EasySpider and pinchtab?
EasySpider is written in JavaScript and pinchtab in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, EasySpider or pinchtab?
Choose EasySpider if you want the larger community (44,765 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose pinchtab if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.