Puppeteer vs WeasyPrint

Overview

Puppeteer

Stacks1.0K

Followers582

Votes26

WeasyPrint

Stacks38

Followers29

Votes0

GitHub Stars8.3K

Forks765

Puppeteer vs WeasyPrint: What are the differences?

Introduction

Here, we will provide a comparison of the key differences between Puppeteer and WeasyPrint, focusing on their specific features and capabilities.

1. Rendering Engine: Puppeteer is powered by Chrome's rendering engine, making it an ideal tool for automating interactions with websites and generating screenshots and PDFs. On the other hand, WeasyPrint is a pure Python library that utilizes the powerful rendering engine from the Gecko project, which is used by Firefox. It offers good support for various web standards and CSS.
2. Language and Environment: Puppeteer is written in JavaScript and runs on Node.js, which makes it suitable for developers familiar with JavaScript and the Node.js ecosystem. WeasyPrint, on the other hand, is written in Python and can be integrated with Python web frameworks. This makes it an excellent choice for Python developers and projects built in Python.
3. Supported File Formats: Puppeteer can generate screenshots and PDFs, making it compatible with image and PDF file formats. WeasyPrint, in addition to generating PDFs, also supports the generation of printable HTML/CSS pages and SVG files. This provides greater flexibility in generating various types of output files.
4. Browser Compatibility: Puppeteer allows automation of tasks using the latest version of the Chromium browser, ensuring compatibility with modern web technologies. However, WeasyPrint uses the Gecko rendering engine, which may not always offer the same level of compatibility with cutting-edge web features.
5. Headless and Headful Mode: Puppeteer supports both headless mode (running without a visible user interface) and headful mode (running with a visible browser window). This allows developers to choose between automating tasks in the background or visually observing the process. WeasyPrint, being mainly a Python library, does not have a dedicated headless mode and is primarily designed for producing offline outputs.
6. Community and Ecosystem: Puppeteer benefits from a large and active community due to its association with the Chromium project and the broader JavaScript ecosystem. It has extensive documentation, a wide range of online resources, and a thriving community of contributors. WeasyPrint, although less popular, has its own community of contributors and maintains a comprehensive documentation.

In summary, Puppeteer and WeasyPrint differ in terms of their rendering engines, programming languages and environments, supported file formats, browser compatibility, headless/headful modes, and community and ecosystem.

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Advice on Puppeteer, WeasyPrint

Ankur

Software Engineer

Dec 4, 2019

Needs advice

I am using Node 12 for server scripting and have a function to generate PDF and send it to a browser. Currently, we are using PhantomJS to generate a PDF. Some web post shows that we can achieve PDF generation using Puppeteer. I was a bit confused. Should we move to puppeteerJS? Which one is better with NodeJS for generating PDF?

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Detailed Comparison

Puppeteer	WeasyPrint
Puppeteer is a Node library which provides a high-level API to control headless Chrome over the DevTools Protocol. It can also be configured to use full (non-headless) Chrome.	It is a visual rendering engine for HTML and CSS that can export to PDF. It aims to support web standards for printing. It is free software made available under a BSD license.
-	URLS; PDF; HTML; Fonts; CSS
Statistics
GitHub Stars -	GitHub Stars 8.3K
GitHub Forks -	GitHub Forks 765
Stacks 1.0K	Stacks 38
Followers 582	Followers 29
Votes 26	Votes 0
Pros & Cons
Pros 10 Scriptable web browser 10 Very well documented 6 Promise based Cons 10 Chrome only	No community feedback yet
Integrations
Node.js	Python Heroku Zapier Dropbox Windows Linux DocGen macOS

What are some alternatives to Puppeteer, WeasyPrint?

Playwright

It is a Node library to automate the Chromium, WebKit and Firefox browsers with a single API. It enables cross-browser web automation that is ever-green, capable, reliable and fast.

PhantomJS

PhantomJS is a headless WebKit scriptable with JavaScript. It is used by hundreds of developers and dozens of organizations for web-related development workflow.

DocRaptor

DocRaptor makes it easy to convert HTML to PDF and XLS format. Choose your document format, select configuration options and make an HTTP POST request to our server. DocRaptor returns your file in a matter of seconds. We provide extensive documentation and examples to get you started, and our API makes it easy to use DocRaptor to generate PDF and Excel files in your own web applications.

HeadlessTesting

Headless Browser Cloud for Developers. Connect your Puppeteer and Playwright scripts to our Cloud. Automated Browser Testing with Puppeteer and Playwright in the Cloud.

Pandoc

It is a free and open-source document converter, widely used as a writing tool and as a basis for publishing workflows. It converts files from one markup format into another. It can convert documents in (several dialects of) Markdown, reStructuredText, textile, HTML, DocBook, LaTeX, MediaWiki markup, TWiki and many more.

jsdom

It is a pure-JavaScript implementation of many web standards, notably the WHATWG DOM and HTML Standards, for use with Node.js. In general, the goal of the project is to emulate enough of a subset of a web browser to be useful for testing and scraping real-world web applications.

Inkfluence AI

Plan, write, and publish books, PDF guides, workbooks, and audiobooks with AI workflows. Customize branding and export instantly.

Reliable PDF API

PDFGate offers a fast and reliable PDF API for developers. Create, process, and manage PDFs at scale with simple, powerful tools.

2dto3D

Upload any image and get a downloadable 3D model in minutes. AI-powered image to 3D conversion with professional quality GLB files. Built by people who actually use 3D tools.

Pixellize

Fast & free online image converter and editor. Resize, compress, and transform images easily with no sign-up required.

Related Comparisons

Puppeteer vs WeasyPrint: What are the differences?

Introduction

Here, we will provide a comparison of the key differences between Puppeteer and WeasyPrint, focusing on their specific features and capabilities.

1. Rendering Engine: Puppeteer is powered by Chrome's rendering engine, making it an ideal tool for automating interactions with websites and generating screenshots and PDFs. On the other hand, WeasyPrint is a pure Python library that utilizes the powerful rendering engine from the Gecko project, which is used by Firefox. It offers good support for various web standards and CSS.
2. Language and Environment: Puppeteer is written in JavaScript and runs on Node.js, which makes it suitable for developers familiar with JavaScript and the Node.js ecosystem. WeasyPrint, on the other hand, is written in Python and can be integrated with Python web frameworks. This makes it an excellent choice for Python developers and projects built in Python.
3. Supported File Formats: Puppeteer can generate screenshots and PDFs, making it compatible with image and PDF file formats. WeasyPrint, in addition to generating PDFs, also supports the generation of printable HTML/CSS pages and SVG files. This provides greater flexibility in generating various types of output files.
4. Browser Compatibility: Puppeteer allows automation of tasks using the latest version of the Chromium browser, ensuring compatibility with modern web technologies. However, WeasyPrint uses the Gecko rendering engine, which may not always offer the same level of compatibility with cutting-edge web features.
5. Headless and Headful Mode: Puppeteer supports both headless mode (running without a visible user interface) and headful mode (running with a visible browser window). This allows developers to choose between automating tasks in the background or visually observing the process. WeasyPrint, being mainly a Python library, does not have a dedicated headless mode and is primarily designed for producing offline outputs.
6. Community and Ecosystem: Puppeteer benefits from a large and active community due to its association with the Chromium project and the broader JavaScript ecosystem. It has extensive documentation, a wide range of online resources, and a thriving community of contributors. WeasyPrint, although less popular, has its own community of contributors and maintains a comprehensive documentation.

Puppeteer vs WeasyPrint

Overview

Puppeteer vs WeasyPrint: What are the differences?