Arcana vs Spider Cloud

Side-by-side comparison of features, pricing, and ratings

Analysis generated Live tool data as of 2026-10-30
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Arcana or Spider Cloud: which should you choose?

DimensionArcanaSpider Cloud
Primary Use CaseEmbeddable RAG for Elixir appsWeb scraping and crawling for AI agents
Target Language/FrameworkElixir/Phoenix onlyAny (API-based)
DeploymentSelf-hosted (embedded in Elixir project)Cloud API (self-hostable core on GitHub)
Key StrengthsDeclarative config, agentic pipelines, no external service needed99.9% success rate, 0.03¢ per 1,000 pages, Browser AI commands
Not ForSimple one-off scrapingNon-Elixir projects

Choose Spider Cloud if you need fast, low-cost web crawling and scraping with AI-powered extraction for any stack. Choose Arcana if you're building RAG inside an Elixir/Phoenix project and want a pure Elixir solution with no external service dependency.

Try ArcanaTry Spider Cloud
Arcana
Arcana

Embeddable RAG for Elixir and Phoenix — vector search, GraphRAG, and agentic retrieval inside your existing Ecto/Postgres repo.

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Spider Cloud
Spider Cloud

Spider Cloud is a scraping, crawling, and web search API that returns clean markdown or JSON for AI agents and RAG pipelines.

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Pricing
Free
Paid
Plans
Open SourceFree
Pay as you go$1/GB
AI Studio AlphaFrom $6/mo
UnlimitedFrom $40/mo
EnterpriseCustom
Popularity
8 views
7.5k views
Skill Level
Intermediate
Intermediate
API Available
Platforms
WebAPI
WebAPIPlugin
Categories
🗄️ Vector Databases & Retrieval📦 LLM App Frameworks & SDKs
🌐 Web Scraping & Search APIs🖱️ Browser & Computer-Use Agents
Features
Advanced RAG via Arcana.search/2 and Arcana.ask/2 with query rewriting
Hybrid semantic plus fulltext retrieval fused with Reciprocal Rank Fusion
Cross-encoder reranking via Bumblebee, local by default
GraphRAG with entity extraction, relationship linking, and Leiden community detection
Graph fusion that merges knowledge-graph results into vector search
Modular RAG via Arcana.Pipeline with replaceable step behaviours
Pipeline steps: gate, rewrite, select, expand, decompose, search, reason, rerank, answer, ground
Agentic RAG via Arcana.Loop with runtime tool selection, tool_history, and terminated_by
Controller/answerer split — cheap fast controller model plus a stronger answering model
NLI hallucination check via Pipeline.ground and Loop.ground with 0.0-1.0 faithfulness score
Self-correction modes (CRAG-inspired) on Pipeline.search/2 and Pipeline.answer/2
Local embeddings via Bumblebee on EXLA, EMLX (Apple Silicon), or Torchx
Cloud LLM model strings such as openai:gpt-4o-mini and zai:glm-4.5-flash
Pluggable behaviours for chunker, embedder, searcher, reranker, and answerer
Ingestion background jobs with Oban and an Igniter installer for migrations and dashboard route
Scrape a page into markdown, JSON, HTML, raw, or plain text
Crawl whole sites with each page streamed as one JSONL line in order
Web search endpoint returns SERP results plus the scraped pages behind them
Browser rendering runs scripts, loads lazy images, and reaches infinite scroll
Load protected pages through Spider's native browser engine with geo checks, returning 200
Full browser sessions over WebSocket at browser.spider.cloud
Provider router runs scrape and crawl requests on outside providers with your own keys
Prompt-based extraction returns named fields as JSON on scrape or crawl
Two-phase AI extraction: fast model for most pages, stronger for complex layouts
Data connectors stream crawl output to S3, GCS, Google Sheets, Azure Blob, or Supabase
Residential and ISP proxy pool with 215M+ exits in 199 countries
MCP server at mcp.spider.cloud for Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, and Claude Desktop
CLI that picks HTTP or a browser per page and stops at your budget
1,000+ scraper examples with working code
API responses in JSON, JSONL, CSV, and XML
Integrations
PostgreSQL
pgvector
Ecto
Phoenix LiveView
LiveDashboard
Bumblebee
EXLA
EMLX
Torchx
Oban
Igniter
LangChain
LlamaIndex
CrewAI
FlowiseAI
Langflow
Dify
Agno
Claude Code
Codex
Cursor
Claude Desktop
Amazon S3
Google Cloud Storage
Google Sheets
Azure Blob Storage

Who should pick Arcana, and who should pick Spider Cloud?

  • Solo founder building an AI agent
    Pick: Spider Cloud

    You need real-time web data and a simple API. Spider Cloud's Rust engine gives fast crawling at low cost, with AI extraction and Browser AI commands to handle complex pages.

  • Elixir developer adding Q&A to a Phoenix app
    Pick: Arcana

    Arcana provides declarative config, built-in dashboard, and deep Phoenix integration. No need to leave the BEAM ecosystem.

  • Enterprise team building a RAG pipeline over documents
    Pick: Spider Cloud

    If your data is on the web, Spider Cloud's 1000+ scraper examples and data connectors (S3, GCS) streamline ingestion. The API fits any stack.

  • Startup wanting a hosted, no-code RAG solution
    Pick: Spider Cloud

    Arcana requires coding in Elixir. For non-Elixir teams, Spider Cloud's API is accessible from any language.

  • Developer needing offline RAG in Elixir
    Pick: Arcana

    Arcana is embeddable and works with local vector stores like pgvector or ETS. No external API calls needed for retrieval.

Frequently Asked Questions

Arcana vs Spider Cloud: which should you choose?

Choose Spider Cloud if you need fast, low-cost web crawling and scraping with AI-powered extraction for any stack. Choose Arcana if you're building RAG inside an Elixir/Phoenix project and want a pure Elixir solution with no external service dependency.

Can I use Spider Cloud with Elixir?

Yes, Spider Cloud is API-based and can be called from any language, including Elixir.

Does Arcana support web scraping?

No, Arcana is for RAG over your own documents. It does not include a web crawler. For web data, use Spider Cloud and feed results into Arcana.

Which is cheaper for high-volume scraping?

Spider Cloud at $0.003/page. Arcana has zero per-page cost but requires self-hosting infrastructure.

Can I self-host Spider Cloud?

Yes, the core engine is open-source on GitHub. The cloud version offers additional features like AI Studio and Browser AI.

Does Arcana require a vector database?

It requires a vector DB backend (Pinecone, Weaviate, pgvector) – but you can host it yourself.

Does Spider Cloud have a free tier?

Yes, a free tier with limited credits. Paid plans start at usage-based $0.003/page.

Can Arcana be used with non-Phoenix Elixir apps?

Yes, but the dashboard uses LiveView, so you'll need Phoenix for that. Core functionality works without Phoenix.

Which tool has better anti-bot detection?

Spider Cloud includes stealth anti-detection and rotating proxies. Arcana has no anti-bot features.

What else are Arcana and Spider Cloud compared with?

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Looker vs Spider Cloud comparison

These tools are not competitors — they solve different problems for different buyers. Spider Cloud is a developer API for pulling live web data into agents and RAG pipelines, with a freemium entry poi

Where can you read more about Arcana and Spider Cloud?

Arcana
View Arcana reviewArcana alternatives
Spider Cloud
View Spider Cloud reviewSpider Cloud alternatives

Browse these categories

Best AI Vector Databases & Retrieval toolsBest AI Web Scraping & Search APIs toolsBest AI LLM App Frameworks & SDKs toolsBest AI Browser & Computer-Use Agents tools
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