Is LibreCrawl really free?

Yes. LibreCrawl is open source: the code is public and installing it costs nothing. At most you pay for hosting if you put it on a server, often a few euros a month. Screaming Frog SEO Spider, on the other hand, costs €22 a month.

Do I need to code to install LibreCrawl?

No. The level is intermediate and the install takes about 15 minutes with the prompt from the page: Claude does the work, you answer its questions.

How is it different from Screaming Frog SEO Spider?

LibreCrawl does most of what Screaming Frog SEO Spider does, without a subscription, and your data stays with you. The point by point comparison is on the page.

Yes. With an open source tool installed on your side, your files stay on your machine or your server. Nobody can close your account or change the price.

Free alternative

Free alternative to Screaming Frog SEO Spider

Screaming Frog SEO Spider costs €22 a month. LibreCrawl does the same job for free, in open source: you install it on your machine or a small server, and you stop paying.

Public entry price, taken from Screaming Frog SEO Spider’s website (screamingfrog.co.uk). Over a year, that is €264 that stays in your pocket.

What replaces Screaming Frog SEO Spider

The main alternative

LibreCrawl

🟡 Intermediate⏱️ ~15 min to installSave €22/mo

LibreCrawl is Screaming Frog without the licence. You give it your site's address, it visits every page and returns what an SEO audit needs: missing or duplicate titles and meta descriptions, headings, broken links, redirect chains, images without alt text, canonicals, sitemap. It renders JavaScript (React, Vue, Angular sites) with a real browser, measures Core Web Vitals through PageSpeed Insights, and exports everything as CSV, Excel, JSON or XML, with no cap. Screaming Frog stops at 500 URLs on the free tier; here there is no limit, the project reports crawls of over a million URLs. It is Python with a web interface in your browser, local or on a server, MIT licence. The repository is one year old, close to 1,000 stars, with fixes every couple of weeks: young, but alive. A plugin workshop lets you add your own analyses.

Loucash’s verdict on LibreCrawl

7/10

If you pay for Screaming Frog to crawl more than 500 pages, LibreCrawl does the job without the licence: same basic checks, JavaScript rendering, Core Web Vitals, unlimited exports. For a site audit, a migration or a monthly follow-up, you have what you need. What I like: the web interface you can share on a server for the whole team, the absence of a cap, and a project that fixes fast, with close to 1,000 stars in a year. What may bite: it is young, carried by a small number of people, with no numbered release; Screaming Frog's advanced reports (fine custom extraction, crawl comparison) are less polished; and the PageSpeed API has its quotas. For regular professional use, keep an eye on the repository's activity.

Who it is for: You do SEO for yourself or for clients and you do not want to pay a yearly licence to crawl more than 500 pages.

See the full page →See the tool ↗

LibreCrawl versus Screaming Frog SEO Spider: the match

Price
LibreCrawl
€0, on your machine or your server
Screaming Frog SEO Spider
279 dollars a year, free tier capped at 500 URLs
URL limit
LibreCrawl
None, crawls of over a million URLs
Screaming Frog SEO Spider
500 on free, unlimited with the licence
JavaScript rendering
LibreCrawl
Included, with a real Chromium
Screaming Frog SEO Spider
Licence only

Screaming Frog SEO Spider ↗

VS	LibreCrawl	Screaming Frog SEO Spider ↗
Price	€0, on your machine or your server	279 dollars a year, free tier capped at 500 URLs
URL limit	None, crawls of over a million URLs	500 on free, unlimited with the licence
JavaScript rendering	Included, with a real Chromium	Licence only
Core Web Vitals	PageSpeed Insights built in	With the licence, through the PageSpeed API
Exports	CSV, Excel, JSON, XML, no limit	Capped on free
Where it runs	Web interface, local or on a shared server	Desktop app, one licence per person

The prompt that installs LibreCrawl

Paste this prompt into Claude: it checks the repository, asks you its questions and installs the tool step by step.

Installe LibreCrawl sur ma machine (crawler SEO open source, dépôt GitHub PhialsBasement/LibreCrawl, site librecrawl.com) en suivant son README. Vérifie d'abord ce que j'ai. Si Docker est installé : clone le dépôt, copie le fichier .env.example en .env et lance docker compose up -d. Sinon : installe Python 3 si besoin, crée un environnement virtuel, installe les dépendances de requirements.txt, lance playwright install chromium puis python main.py --local. Ouvre ensuite http://localhost:5000 et vérifie que la page répond. Fais un premier crawl de test sur une petite page pour confirmer que tout marche, avec le rendu JavaScript activé. Si c'est un serveur exposé sur internet, protège l'accès (mot de passe ou reverse proxy avec authentification) avant de me donner l'adresse.

Review the GitHub repository and check whether it is safe to install given my machine and my infrastructure. Ask me as many questions as possible, using widgets, to clarify my request and be as precise as you can.

Frequently asked questions

Is LibreCrawl really free?: Yes. LibreCrawl is open source: the code is public and installing it costs nothing. At most you pay for hosting if you put it on a server, often a few euros a month. Screaming Frog SEO Spider, on the other hand, costs €22 a month.
Do I need to code to install LibreCrawl?: No. The level is intermediate and the install takes about 15 minutes with the prompt from the page: Claude does the work, you answer its questions.
How is it different from Screaming Frog SEO Spider?: LibreCrawl does most of what Screaming Frog SEO Spider does, without a subscription, and your data stays with you. The point by point comparison is on the page.
Do I own my data?: Yes. With an open source tool installed on your side, your files stay on your machine or your server. Nobody can close your account or change the price.