Playwright Scraper Skill

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

🎯 Use Case Matrix

Target Website	Anti-Bot Level	Recommended Method	Script
Regular Sites	Low	web_fetch tool	N/A (built-in)
Dynamic Sites	Medium	Playwright Simple	scripts/playwright-simple.js
Cloudflare Protected	High	Playwright Stealth ⭐	scripts/playwright-stealth.js
YouTube	Special	deep-scraper	Install separately
Reddit	Special	reddit-scraper	Install separately

📦 Installation

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

🚀 Quick Start

1️⃣ Simple Sites (No Anti-Bot)

Use OpenClaw's built-in web_fetch tool:

# Invoke directly in OpenClaw
Hey, fetch me the content from https://example.com

2️⃣ Dynamic Sites (Requires JavaScript)

Use Playwright Simple:

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

Example output:

{
  "url": "https://example.com",
  "title": "Example Domain",
  "content": "...",
  "elapsedSeconds": "3.45"
}

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

4️⃣ YouTube Video Transcripts

Use deep-scraper (install separately):

# Install deep-scraper skill
npx clawhub install deep-scraper

# Use it
cd skills/deep-scraper
node assets/youtube_handler.js "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO_ID"

📖 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

🎓 Best Practices

1. Try web_fetch First

If the site doesn't have dynamic loading, use OpenClaw's web_fetch tool—it's fastest.

2. Need JavaScript? Use Playwright Simple

If you need to wait for JavaScript rendering, use playwright-simple.js.

3. Getting Blocked? Use Stealth

If you encounter 403 or Cloudflare challenges, use playwright-stealth.js.

4. Special Sites Need Specialized Skills

YouTube → deep-scraper
Reddit → reddit-scraper
Twitter → bird skill

🔧 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

📊 Performance Comparison

Method	Speed	Anti-Bot	Success Rate (Discuss.com.hk)
web_fetch	⚡ Fastest	❌ None	0%
Playwright Simple	🚀 Fast	⚠️ Low	20%
Playwright Stealth	⏱️ Medium	✅ Medium	100% ✅
Puppeteer Stealth	⏱️ Medium	✅ Medium-High	~80%
Crawlee (deep-scraper)	🐢 Slow	❌ Detected	0%
Chaser (Rust)	⏱️ Medium	❌ Detected	0%

🛡️ Anti-Bot Techniques Summary

Lessons learned from our testing:

✅ Effective Anti-Bot Measures

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

❌ Ineffective Anti-Bot Measures

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

🔍 Troubleshooting

Issue: 403 Forbidden

Solution: Use playwright-stealth.js

Issue: Cloudflare Challenge Page

Solution:

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

Issue: Blank Page

Solution:

Increase waitForTimeout
Use waitUntil: 'networkidle' or 'domcontentloaded'
Check if login is required

📝 Memory & Experience

2026-02-07 Discuss.com.hk Test Conclusions

✅ Pure Playwright + Stealth succeeded (5s, 200 OK)
❌ Crawlee (deep-scraper) failed (403)
❌ Chaser (Rust) failed (Cloudflare)
❌ Puppeteer standard failed (403)

Best Solution: Pure Playwright + anti-bot techniques (framework-independent)

🚧 Future Improvements

Add proxy IP rotation
Implement cookie management (maintain login state)
Add CAPTCHA handling (2captcha / Anti-Captcha)
Batch scraping (parallel URLs)
Integration with OpenClaw's browser tool

📚 References

Playwright Official Docs
puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth
deep-scraper skill

Playwright Scraper Skill

AI Skill Market Insights

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