Apify vs. Diffbot: Platform Flexibility vs AI-Powered Extraction
Choose Apify for the breadth of 30,000+ ready-made Actors, low $29/month entry, scheduling, storage, and flexible custom code. Choose Diffbot for automatic AI structuring across diverse sites and its Knowledge Graph of 246M+ companies, best suited to enterprise-scale entity extraction. Apify wins on cost and flexibility; Diffbot wins on hands-off structuring.
Apify and Diffbot both extract structured data from the web, but they approach the problem differently. Apify is a full scraping platform with 30,000+ pre-built Actors, cloud execution, and storage. Diffbot is an AI-powered extraction service with Extract APIs, a Natural Language API, and a Knowledge Graph that identifies entities and relationships without custom parsing logic.
This guide compares them head-to-head so you can pick the right tool for your use case.
Quick Answer
Apify is better if you need pre-built scrapers for specific sites, want full control over extraction logic, or need scheduling and storage in one platform.
Diffbot is better if you're extracting diverse content types, want automatic entity recognition, or need a knowledge graph without writing custom parsers.
Full Comparison Table
| Category | Apify | Diffbot |
|---|---|---|
| Primary role | Full scraping platform: Actors, execution, storage, scheduling | AI-powered extraction: automatic entity and relationship detection |
| Pre-built scrapers | 30,000+ Store Actors for major sites (Amazon, Maps, LinkedIn, etc.) | None, AI extracts from any page automatically |
| Extraction approach | Custom code per site (JavaScript/Python) or pre-built Actor | AI-driven: identifies entities, relationships, and schema automatically |
| Output format | Structured JSON/CSV per Actor; customizable schema | Normalized entities, relationships, knowledge graph |
| Setup time | Minutes for Store Actors; hours for custom code | Minutes: point at URLs, get structured data |
| Hosting & runs | Managed cloud (serverless Actors) | Managed cloud (API-based) |
| Scheduling | Native cron, webhooks, API triggers | External (your cron, queue, or orchestrator) |
| Storage | Built-in Datasets and Key-Value Stores | None; your DB, S3, or data warehouse |
| JavaScript rendering | Per Actor (Playwright/Puppeteer/Crawlee) | Automatic (handles JS-heavy sites) |
| Proxy rotation | Platform proxies + optional residential | Managed pool; geo options available |
| Custom parsing | Full control via Crawlee SDK | Limited; AI does the parsing |
| Knowledge graph | No | Yes, plus a pre-indexed graph (246M+ companies, 1.6B+ articles) to query and enrich |
| Integrations | Make, n8n, Zapier, Google Sheets, Airbyte, etc. | Webhooks; limited integrations |
| Best mental model | "Run scrapers and store results here" | "Feed URLs, get normalized entities" |
Concrete example: Extracting company data from 1,000 business websites. With Apify, you'd find or build a custom Actor to parse each site's structure. With Diffbot, you'd feed the URLs to their API and get back normalized company entities (name, industry, employees, funding) automatically.
Pricing (verify before you buy)
Pricing changes often. Confirm on Diffbot pricing and Apify pricing before budgeting.
| Tier | Diffbot | Apify |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0, 10,000 credits, no card required | $5/month recurring platform credit |
| Entry | $299/month Startup (250,000 credits) | $29/month Starter |
| Mid | $899/month Plus (1,000,000 credits) | $199/month Scale |
| Scale | Enterprise (custom) | $999/month Business |
| Enterprise | Custom | Custom |
Diffbot now lists public pricing: Free ($0, 10,000 credits, no credit card), Startup ($299/mo, 250,000 credits) and Plus ($899/mo, 1,000,000 credits), with Enterprise custom. A credit roughly maps to one API call (one page extraction = 1 credit; one Knowledge Graph record export = 25 credits). Verify the live figures on Diffbot pricing before budgeting.
How billing differs
- Diffbot. Per credit (API call). Public tiers with fixed credit allotments; overage billed pro rata at the plan's per-credit rate. Enterprise is custom.
- Apify. Compute Units (RAM × time). Cost depends on Actor weight and target site difficulty. Public pricing tiers with included monthly usage that matches the plan price.
| Monthly volume | Rough read |
|---|---|
| Light / tests | Both have a free tier to evaluate (Diffbot 10,000 credits, Apify $5/month credit) |
| Steady moderate volume | Diffbot's entry Startup tier is $299/mo; Apify Starter is $29/mo, so compare per-result economics |
| Very high volume, diverse sites | Diffbot's automatic extraction may reduce engineering time; compare total cost |
| Need pre-built scrapers + schedules | Apify often wins on total engineering time |
When to Use Which
| Your situation | Better fit |
|---|---|
| Extract from 50+ different site types | Diffbot (automatic extraction) |
| Scrape Amazon, LinkedIn, TikTok, etc. | Apify (Store Actors) |
| Build a knowledge graph of entities | Diffbot |
| Recurring jobs + cloud storage + webhooks | Apify |
| You want a low-cost entry tier | Apify ($29/mo Starter vs Diffbot's $299/mo Startup) |
| You need custom parsing logic | Apify |
| Automatic entity recognition across diverse content | Diffbot |
| You prefer owning 100% of extraction logic | Apify |
Choose Diffbot when
- You're extracting from many different site types and don't want to build custom parsers for each.
- You need automatic entity recognition (companies, people, products, relationships).
- You're building a knowledge graph or entity-centric data system.
- You want minimal setup: point at URLs and get normalized data.
- Your team is data-focused rather than engineering-focused.
Explore Diffbot (free tier with 10,000 credits, no card required).
Choose Apify when
- You want pre-built Actors for specific sites (Amazon, Maps, LinkedIn, TikTok, etc.).
- You need scheduling, datasets, and exports without operating your own job runners.
- You want a low-cost entry tier and easy cost forecasting (Starter is $29/mo).
- You need custom extraction logic for niche or proprietary sites.
- You're building AI workflows and want MCP or API-first automation.
Start with Apify (free tier with monthly credits; no card required for signup).
Side-by-Side: Common Use Cases
| Use case | Diffbot | Apify | Practical pick |
|---|---|---|---|
| Extract company data from 100 websites | Strong fit (automatic) | Possible (custom Actor) | Diffbot |
| Scrape Amazon prices daily | You build parser | Store Actor | Apify |
| Build entity database from web | Strong fit | Possible | Diffbot |
| Scheduled price monitoring | You schedule | Built-in schedules | Apify |
| Extract from 5 specific sites | Possible | Strong fit (pre-built) | Apify |
| Knowledge graph construction | Strong fit | Possible | Diffbot |
| LLM training data pipeline | Possible | Strong fit | Apify |
How They Fit Your Stack
Diffbot is usually an API call: send URLs to their extraction endpoint, get back normalized entities in JSON. No scheduling, no storage, so you handle that downstream. See Diffbot API documentation.
Apify exposes REST, JavaScript and Python SDKs, webhooks, and integrations. New scrapers often use Crawlee for queues, retries, sessions, and storage primitives. Scheduled runs store results in Datasets automatically.
What Diffbot Does Well
- Automatic entity extraction: the Extract API identifies companies, people, products, and relationships without custom parsing rules.
- Diverse content types: handles news articles, product pages, and company profiles with the same API.
- Knowledge Graph: a pre-indexed graph of 246M+ companies and 1.6B+ articles you can query and enrich against, not just build from scratch.
- Natural Language API: pulls entities, relationships, and sentiment from raw text.
- Minimal setup: no custom code needed for most use cases.
What Apify Adds
- Pre-built scrapers for 30,000+ specific sites (Amazon, LinkedIn, TikTok, Google Maps, etc.).
- Scheduling and storage: run jobs on a schedule, store results in Datasets, export to Google Sheets or S3.
- Custom extraction: full control via Crawlee SDK (JavaScript/Python) for niche or proprietary sites.
- Integrations: Make, n8n, Zapier, Airbyte, and others.
- AI and RAG data: ready-made AI data Actors and pipelines for LLM training and RAG.
- Low-cost entry: public tiers starting at $29/mo, easy cost forecasting.
Not in absolute terms; they solve different problems. Diffbot excels at automatic entity extraction from diverse sites. Apify excels at pre-built scrapers for specific sites and full-platform workflows (scheduling, storage, integrations). Better depends on whether you need automatic extraction or pre-built site-specific scrapers.
Diffbot uses AI to automatically extract entities and relationships from any page without custom parsing. Apify is a full platform with 30,000+ pre-built Actors, cloud execution, storage, and scheduling. Diffbot is extraction-focused; Apify is platform-focused.
Diffbot offers a free plan with 10,000 credits and no credit card required, kept for as long as you like. Paid tiers are public (Startup $299/mo, Plus $899/mo, Enterprise custom). Apify offers a free tier with a $5/month recurring credit and no card required.
Yes. You could call Diffbot's API from within a custom Apify Actor to extract entities, then store results in an Apify Dataset. This combines Diffbot's automatic extraction with Apify's scheduling and storage. However, it adds complexity and cost, so most teams pick one primary approach.
No. Apify Actors use custom code (JavaScript/Python) or pre-built parsers for specific sites. For automatic entity extraction across diverse content, use Diffbot, or build a custom Actor that calls Diffbot's API.
Apify's entry Starter plan is $29/month; Diffbot's entry Startup plan is $299/month for 250,000 credits. Both publish pricing and both have a free tier to evaluate. Apify is cheaper to start; for heavy automatic entity extraction across diverse sites, compare total cost on real volume.
Yes. Diffbot's automatic entity and relationship extraction is well-suited for building knowledge graphs. Apify is not designed for this use case, so you would need to build custom extraction logic or call Diffbot from an Apify Actor.
Not natively. Apify Actors require custom parsing code. However, you could build a custom Actor that calls Diffbot's API for automatic extraction, then stores results in Apify Datasets. This gives you Diffbot's extraction plus Apify's scheduling and storage.
No. Diffbot now publishes self-serve tiers (free with 10,000 credits, Startup at $299/month, Plus at $899/month) alongside a custom Enterprise plan. Its sweet spot is still enterprise-scale entity extraction and Knowledge Graph access (246M+ companies, 1.6B+ articles), where automatic structuring saves engineering time. For smaller projects, Apify's $29/month Starter is a lower-cost entry.
Apify, in most cases. Its ready-made AI data Actors and crawlers feed clean text and structured records straight into LLM training and RAG workflows, with built-in scheduling and storage. Diffbot suits AI projects that need automatic entity recognition or knowledge-graph enrichment, which you can also call from inside an Apify Actor.
Next Steps
- Browse the Apify vs. the World hub to see every head-to-head comparison.
- Explore Apify Alternatives for a full roundup of scraping platforms.
- Compare Apify vs. Firecrawl if you're also evaluating LLM-focused extraction.
- Compare Apify vs. Crawl4AI for open-source AI crawling, or Apify vs. Clay for enrichment workflows.
- Browse the best AI data Actors for ready-made extraction building blocks.
- Learn about Data for AI & RAG if you're building LLM pipelines.
- Check Apify Pricing for detailed plan tiers and compute unit costs.