Electric vs Spider Cloud

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

Analysis reviewed Live tool data as of 2026-09-01
Cross-checked through our multi-step verification ·
Saved

At a glance

DimensionElectricSpider Cloud
PricingUsage-based (Electric Cloud) or self-hosted (free)Free tier + usage-based; AI Studio add-on $6/mo
Primary use caseCollaborative multi-agent systems with Postgres syncWeb crawling and scraping for AI agents
Core enginePostgres sync engine with Shapes partial replicationRust-based crawling engine
Client librariesTypeScript, Elixir, Phoenix, TanStack DBAPI-based; integrations with LangChain, LlamaIndex, etc.
Unique featureDurable Streams with Fork (rewind, branch, probe); Yjs collaborationBrowser AI commands (Act, Extract, Observe) via WebSocket
Open sourceOpen-source core (Agents, Streams, Sync)Open-source core on GitHub

Choose Electric if you need to build real-time, collaborative multi-agent systems with Postgres sync and durable agent runtimes. Choose Spider Cloud if you need fast, cost-effective web crawling and scraping for AI agents and RAG pipelines. They solve different problems: Electric is for live data sync and agent orchestration, Spider Cloud for external data extraction.

Try ElectricTry Spider Cloud
Electric
Electric

Real-time Postgres sync and durable HTTP streams for building collaborative, multi-agent systems.

Visit Website
Spider Cloud
Spider Cloud

AI web scraping API: crawl, scrape, search any site into markdown or JSON at 10k req/min.

Visit Website
Pricing
Freemium
Freemium
Plans
$0/mo
$249/mo
$1,999/mo
Custom
$1/GB + $0.001/min compute
$40/mo (2 concurrency)
$6/mo
Popularity
0 views
7.5k views
Skill Level
Advanced
Intermediate
API Available
Platforms
WebAPI
WebAPICLI
Categories
⚙️ Developer Infrastructure🧠 Agent Memory & Runtimes
🌐 Web Scraping & Search APIs🖱️ Browser & Computer-Use Agents
Features
Postgres Sync: read-path sync engine with partial replication via Shapes
Durable Streams: persistent, addressable real-time HTTP streams
TanStack DB: reactive client store with sub-millisecond reactivity
PGlite: embeddable Postgres for browser and edge runtimes
Shapes: control which subsets of Postgres data sync to clients
Fork: branch any Durable Stream for rewinding and probing
StreamDB: reactive database in a Durable Stream with Standard Schema
Yjs over HTTP on Durable Streams for collaborative editing
Electric Agents: runtime and SDK for multi-agent systems
Function-based auth parameters in TypeScript client
TypeScript and Elixir/Phoenix client libraries
Electric Cloud: managed service with CDN caching and request collapsing
Telemetry: real-time system monitoring
Self-hosted deployment option (open source, Apache 2.0)
Scrape any website into markdown, JSON, or raw HTML
Full-site crawling at 100K+ pages/sec
10,000 core API requests per minute default
Web Search API: SERP + scraping + extraction in one call
/ai/search endpoint with relevance gate to skip irrelevant pages
Silk AI model: HTML-to-structured data and captcha solving on GPUs
Browser Cloud: full browser sessions over CDP
AI commands (Act, Extract, Observe) via WebSocket with AI Studio
Multiple output formats: HTML, raw, plain text, markdown, JSON, JSONL, CSV, XML
Stealth browser layer and Unblocker for anti-bot sites
Proxy pool with 215M+ residential and ISP IPs across 199+ countries
Robots.txt compliance on by default, disable per-request
data_connectors parameter: pipe results to S3, GCS, Google Sheets, Azure Blob, Supabase
extraction_schema parameter: AI output conforms to JSON schema
1,000+ ready-made scraper examples across 32 categories
Integrations
Postgres
Redis
Yjs
MobX
TanStack
Next.js
React
Phoenix
Expo
LiveStore
Supabase
Cloudflare
AWS
Crunchy Data
Digital Ocean
LangChain
LlamaIndex
CrewAI
FlowiseAI
AutoGen
Agno

What real users say: Electric vs Spider Cloud

Not marketing copy and not our opinion — a structured sweep of public discussion (reviews, forums, communities and video comments), showing what people praise and what they complain about for each tool.

Electric

67 mentions across 6 sources · 49% positive — mixed

Reddit, Hacker News, App Store, GitHub, Lemmy, Tech Press

What users praise

  • • High-performance sync engine using Rust (nearly 1M ops/sec).
  • • Deep Postgres integration with Shapes for partial replication.
  • • CRDT support via Yjs for real-time collaborative editing.
  • • Open-source (Apache 2.0) with TypeScript and Elixir clients.

What frustrates them

  • • App forces ads even for purchased devices.
  • • Requires account sign-up and unnecessary permissions.
  • • Frequent device offline status requiring app restart.
  • • Steep learning curve for sync primitives and agent runtime.

Researched Jul 3, 2026

Spider Cloud

41 mentions across 2 sources · 0% positive — critical

YouTube, Lemmy

What users praise

  • • Competitive pay-as-you-go pricing at $1/GB with no expiry.
  • • Default rate limit of 10,000 requests per minute is generous.
  • • Broad output formats (HTML, markdown, JSON, CSV) cover diverse needs.
  • • Integrated Web Search API bundles SERP and extraction for AI agents.

What frustrates them

  • • No community feedback to confirm reliability or performance.
  • • Self-reported metrics lack independent verification.
  • • Stealth browser success may vary across real sites.
  • • Potential legal risks from scraping; compliance is user's responsibility.

Researched Aug 26, 2026

Who should pick which

  • Solo founder building a local-first collaborative app
    Pick: Electric

    Electric provides Postgres sync, Yjs for collaboration, and TanStack DB for sub-millisecond reactivity — perfect for a multi-user real-time app.

  • AI agent developer needing real-time web data for RAG
    Pick: Spider Cloud

    Spider Cloud's fast crawling with Rust engine, 99.9% success rate, and structured output fits RAG pipelines. AI commands via WebSocket add agentic control.

  • Team building durable, resumable AI agent loops
    Pick: Electric

    Electric Agents runtime with Durable Streams and Fork enables long-lived, auditable agents with rewind/branch capabilities.

  • Developer adding web scraping to an LLM tool
    Pick: Spider Cloud

    Spider Cloud's API is straightforward with 1,000+ examples and connectors. Low cost scales with usage.

  • Large company requiring regulated data sync across regions
    Pick: Electric

    Electric Cloud's CDN caching and self-hosted option provide control; Postgres sync supports compliance.

Frequently Asked Questions

Electric vs Spider Cloud: which should you choose?

Choose Electric if you need to build real-time, collaborative multi-agent systems with Postgres sync and durable agent runtimes. Choose Spider Cloud if you need fast, cost-effective web crawling and scraping for AI agents and RAG pipelines. They solve different problems: Electric is for live data sync and agent orchestration, Spider Cloud for external data extraction.

Can Electric be used for web scraping?

No, Electric is for syncing Postgres data to clients and managing agent streams — not for crawling external websites.

Does Spider Cloud support real-time collaboration?

No, Spider Cloud is a crawling/scraping API; it does not offer real-time sync or collaborative editing features.

Are both tools open-source?

Yes, both have open-source cores: Electric's Agents, Streams, and Sync are open source; Spider Cloud's core is on GitHub.

Which tool has better integration with AI frameworks?

Spider Cloud integrates with LangChain, LlamaIndex, CrewAI, etc. Electric integrates with React, Next.js, Phoenix, and Yjs but not directly with LLM frameworks.

What is the pricing for Electric Cloud?

Usage-based; exact rates not specified. Self-hosted is free. Contact Electric for details.

Can Spider Cloud handle JavaScript-heavy sites?

Yes, via Browser Cloud with stealth anti-detection and Browser AI commands for interaction.

Does Electric support offline-first apps?

Yes, with PGlite (embeddable Postgres) and TanStack DB, apps can work offline and sync later.

What is the latest feature added to Spider Cloud?

As of March 2026, Browser AI commands (Act, Extract, Observe) via WebSocket are now available.

More Electric or Spider Cloud comparisons

Vercel vs Spider Cloud comparison

Choose Vercel if you need to deploy full-stack apps or AI agents with sandboxed execution, global CDN, and rich framework integrations. Choose Spider Cloud if your primary need is fast, reliable web s

Power BI vs Spider Cloud comparison

If your stack lives inside Microsoft 365 and you need governed, interactive dashboards, Power BI is the natural choice with unmatched ecosystem integration. But if you're building AI agents or RAG pip

LM Studio vs Spider Cloud comparison

If you need to run LLMs locally for privacy and agentic workflows, LM Studio is the free, polished choice with recent updates like multi-GPU tensor parallelism and MTP speculative decoding. If your pr

Tableau vs Spider Cloud comparison

Tableau and Spider Cloud serve entirely different purposes: Tableau is a full-featured BI platform for human analysts building interactive dashboards, while Spider Cloud is a purpose-built scraping AP

Amplitude vs Spider Cloud comparison

Spider Cloud and Amplitude solve entirely different problems. Choose Spider Cloud if you need high-volume, low-cost web data extraction for AI agents and RAG pipelines—it’s purpose-built for that. Cho

Looker vs Spider Cloud comparison

Choose Spider Cloud if you need a fast, low-cost web scraping API for feeding real-time data into AI agents and RAG pipelines. Choose Looker if you're an enterprise on Google Cloud needing governed, A

Explore each tool further

Electric
View Electric reviewElectric alternatives
Spider Cloud
View Spider Cloud reviewSpider Cloud alternatives

Browse these categories

Best AI Developer Infrastructure toolsBest AI Web Scraping & Search APIs toolsBest AI Agent Memory & Runtimes toolsBest AI Browser & Computer-Use Agents tools
Still deciding? Get the weekly AI tools brief

One email a week — new tools, honest comparisons, no spam.

Last reviewed: July 3, 2026