Cheerio

Cheerio is a fast, flexible, and lightweight JavaScript library used for parsing and manipulating HTML and XML. It is primarily designed for server-side use with Node.js and provides a jQuery-like syntax for traversing the DOM. Cheerio is commonly used in web scraping tasks where developers need to extract and manipulate content from static HTML pages.

Also known as: Cheerio.js, jQuery for the server

Comparisons

  • Cheerio vs. jQuery: Cheerio implements a subset of jQuery’s core functionality, but it operates in a Node.js environment and does not support browser-specific features like event handling or animations.
  • Cheerio vs. Puppeteer: Cheerio is ideal for scraping static HTML, while Puppeteer is better suited for dynamic content rendered by JavaScript.

Pros

  • Lightweight and fast: Ideal for static HTML parsing without loading a full browser
  • Familiar syntax: Uses jQuery-like selectors, making it easy to learn and use
  • Integrates well with other Node.js tools: Works seamlessly in web scraping pipelines

Cons

  • No JavaScript execution: Cannot render or interact with dynamic content
  • Limited to static HTML: Not suitable for websites that heavily rely on client-side rendering

Example

A developer uses Cheerio to extract article titles and links from a blog’s HTML:

const cheerio = require('cheerio');
const html = '<ul><li><a href="/post1">Post 1</a></li><li><a href="/post2">Post 2</a></li></ul>';


const $ = cheerio.load(html);
$('a').each((i, el) => {
  console.log($(el).text(), $(el).attr('href'));
});

This script will print the titles and URLs of the blog posts, showcasing how Cheerio helps navigate and scrape static web content efficiently.

© 2018-2025 decodo.com. All Rights Reserved