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What is autonomous web extraction?
Autonomous web extraction uses AI agents to find and extract data from websites without writing site-specific code. You describe what you want, and the agent searches, navigates, and returns structured results.
| Factor | Traditional Extraction | Autonomous Extraction |
|---|---|---|
| Setup | Selectors and scripts per site | Natural language prompt |
| Site changes | Scripts break | Agent adapts |
| Multi-page flows | Custom logic needed | Agent navigates on its own |
Use it when data is scattered across sites, requires interaction (logins, filters, pagination), or when site structures change often. For known URLs with stable layouts, a standard scraping API is faster.
Tools like Firecrawl Agent handles this out of the box. No URLs or selectors needed. Pair this with Firecrawl's Browser Sandbox for secure, fully managed environments where AI agents can interact with the web and extract data.
Last updated: Feb 23, 2026
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The easiest way to extract
data from the web
data from the web
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