SpiderHead vs Screaming Frog
We mapped all 320 issues from Screaming Frog's public issues list to SpiderHead's 182 checks. Where it matches, where it only partly does, where it does not — and where each tool is the better fit.
SpiderHead
Open-source crawler + audit toolkit for people and AI agents
Screaming Frog
The established desktop SEO crawler
Same depth of crawl, different reach
Both crawl and audit deeply. Screaming Frog is built around a person at a desktop. SpiderHead adds the agent side: an MCP server with 170 tools, a CLI and saved projects that an AI agent can pick up.
- Horizontal: how deep the crawl and audit go.
- Vertical: how ready it is for agents and automation.
- Band: toolkits — strong in scripts, weaker in UI.
Positioning is our reading of public features, not a benchmark.
What each one does
| Capability | SpiderHead | Screaming Frog |
|---|---|---|
| Getting started | ||
| Price | Yes: Free, open source | Partly: Free tier, licence for full crawls |
| Runs on your machine | Yes: no hosted account | Yes: Yes |
| Reads Screaming Frog exports | Yes: Offline, no SF install | Yes: Native |
| Interfaces | ||
| Desktop app | Yes: macOS · Windows · Linux | Yes: Yes |
| Command line | Yes: 161 commands | Yes: Yes |
| MCP server for AI agents | Yes: 170 tools | No / not found in our check: Not in our check |
| Audit | ||
| Issue coverageSF issues list vs SH checks | Yes: 182 checks · 48 beyond SF | Yes: 320 issues |
| Response codes, titles, canonicals, hreflang | Yes: Matched | Yes: Yes |
| JavaScript rendered vs raw | Partly: Separate render check | Yes: In the crawl |
| PageSpeed / Lighthouse | Partly: Lab timings + CrUX | Yes: Yes |
| Accessibility | No / not found in our check: 7 of 92 | Yes: Yes |
| AMP | No / not found in our check: 1 of 16 | Yes: Yes |
| Canonical graph, document skeleton, trust evidence | Yes: Yes | No / not found in our check: No counterpart |
| Never a false cleanfinding · clean · skipped · failed | Yes: Every check | No / not found in our check: Not in our check |
| After the audit | ||
| Tasks, recheck of fixes, remediation ledger | Yes: Yes | No / not found in our check: Not in our check |
320 Screaming Frog issues, mapped
Without Accessibility (92 issues): 117 full · 49 partly · 62 not matched. 48 SpiderHead checks have no Screaming Frog counterpart.
- H16 · 0 · 0
- Sitemaps6 · 0 · 0
- Pagination6 · 0 · 1
- Hreflang10 · 1 · 1
- URL9 · 1 · 1
- Canonicals8 · 1 · 1
- Page Titles7 · 2 · 0
- Links9 · 1 · 2
- Meta Description6 · 2 · 0
- Response Codes11 · 2 · 2
- Images5 · 0 · 2
- Directives7 · 1 · 2
- Validation6 · 1 · 3
- Structured Data3 · 0 · 3
- Content5 · 5 · 1
- Security5 · 7 · 0
- H22 · 2 · 1
- Mobile2 · 0 · 4
- JavaScript2 · 10 · 4
- PageSpeed2 · 4 · 13
- Accessibility4 · 3 · 85
- AMP0 · 1 · 15
- Search Console0 · 8 · 2
- Analytics0 · 0 · 4
Tabs sorted by coverage. Numbers: full · partly · not matched.
A partial match means a related check exists with a different threshold or scope, or the logic exists in a separate tool and is not yet a crawl finding.
Where each one is stronger
SpiderHead
- Runs locally and free: no licence, no hosted account. The Screaming Frog export analyzer needs no SF installation.
- 48 of SpiderHead's 182 checks have no Screaming Frog counterpart: for example the canonical graph, element position in the document skeleton, trust and attribution evidence, and pagination series checks.
- Every check reports a finding, ran without findings, skipped or failed, so missing evidence is never shown as a clean result.
- An MCP server for AI agents, a CLI and a desktop app over the same retained scans and projects.
- Tasks with fixes, recheck of fixes and a remediation ledger after the release.
Screaming Frog
- Accessibility: 92 issues, of which SpiderHead fully matches 4 and partly 3.
- PageSpeed and Lighthouse audits: 13 issues with no match; SpiderHead's lab timings and CrUX field data cover only part of this tab.
- AMP: 15 of 16 issues have no match.
- JavaScript: raw versus rendered comparisons exist as a separate render check, but most are not yet crawl findings (10 partial, 4 missing).
- Search Console and Analytics tabs inside the crawl: data can be collected and joined, but most are not reported as crawl issues.
How we compared
- Screaming Frog's list is read from its public issues page and summarised, not copied.
- A partial match means a related check exists with a different threshold or scope, or the logic exists in a separate tool and is not yet a crawl finding.
- For two issues (near duplicates and non-indexable URLs in the sitemap) the full match holds for Screaming Frog exports but not yet for SpiderHead's native crawl.
- Native crawls and Screaming Frog are different collectors and may discover different URL populations.
Already use Screaming Frog?
Point SpiderHead at your exports and get an audit and a task list offline — no Screaming Frog installation needed.
Screaming Frog import