Playwright Scraper Skill

Playwright Scraper Skill

A Playwright-based web scraping skill with anti-bot protection. Choose the best approach based on the target website's anti-bot level.

🎯 Use Case Matrix

📦 Installation

cd playwright-scraper-skill
npm install
npx playwright install chromium

🚀 Quick Start

1️⃣ Simple Sites (No Anti-Bot)

Use built-in web_fetch tool for static sites.

2️⃣ Dynamic Sites (Requires JavaScript)

Use Playwright Simple:

node scripts/playwright-simple.js "https://example.com"

3️⃣ Anti-Bot Protected Sites (Cloudflare etc.)

Use Playwright Stealth:

node scripts/playwright-stealth.js "https://m.discuss.com.hk/#hot"

Features:

• Hide automation markers (navigator.webdriver = false)
• Realistic User-Agent (iPhone, Android)
• Random delays to mimic human behavior
• Screenshot and HTML saving support

📖 Script Descriptions

scripts/playwright-simple.js

• Use Case: Regular dynamic websites
• Speed: Fast (3-5 seconds)
• Anti-Bot: None
• Output: JSON (title, content, URL)

scripts/playwright-stealth.js ⭐

• Use Case: Sites with Cloudflare or anti-bot protection
• Speed: Medium (5-20 seconds)
• Anti-Bot: Medium-High (hides automation, realistic UA)
• Output: JSON + Screenshot + HTML file
• Verified: 100% success on Discuss.com.hk

🔧 Customization

All scripts support environment variables:

# Set screenshot path
SCREENSHOT_PATH=/path/to/screenshot.png node scripts/playwright-stealth.js URL

# Set wait time (milliseconds)
WAIT_TIME=10000 node scripts/playwright-simple.js URL

# Enable headful mode (show browser)
HEADLESS=false node scripts/playwright-stealth.js URL

# Save HTML
SAVE_HTML=true node scripts/playwright-stealth.js URL

# Custom User-Agent
USER_AGENT="Mozilla/5.0 ..." node scripts/playwright-stealth.js URL

🛡️ Anti-Bot Techniques Summary

✅ Effective Anti-Bot Measures

1. Hide navigator.webdriver — Essential
2. Realistic User-Agent — Use real devices (iPhone, Android)
3. Mimic Human Behavior — Random delays, scrolling
4. Avoid Framework Signatures — Crawlee, Selenium are easily detected
5. Use addInitScript (Playwright) — Inject before page load

❌ Ineffective Anti-Bot Measures

1. Only changing User-Agent — Not enough
2. Using high-level frameworks (Crawlee) — More easily detected
3. Docker isolation — Doesn't help with Cloudflare

🔍 Troubleshooting

Issue: 403 Forbidden

Solution: Use playwright-stealth.js

Issue: Cloudflare Challenge Page

Solution:

1. Increase wait time (10-15 seconds)
2. Try headless: false (headful mode sometimes has higher success rate)
3. Consider using proxy IPs

📚 References

• Playwright Official Docs
• puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth