scraperapi-java-sdk

ScraperAPI — Java SDK Best Practices

Requires: Java 8+, Maven or Gradle, SCRAPERAPI_API_KEY environment variable.

Setup

Maven

<dependency>
  <groupId>com.scraperapi</groupId>
  <artifactId>sdk</artifactId>
  <version>1.2</version>
</dependency>

Gradle

implementation 'com.scraperapi:sdk:1.2'

Client instantiation

import com.scraperapi.ScraperApiClient;

ScraperApiClient client = new ScraperApiClient(System.getenv("SCRAPERAPI_API_KEY"));

Never hardcode the API key. Read it from the environment every time.

Basic Usage

The Java SDK uses a fluent builder pattern. Chain parameter methods onto the result of .get(), then call .result() to block and retrieve the HTML.

// Simple GET — returns HTML as a String
String html = client.get("https://example.com/").result();

// With parameters — chain before .result()
String html = client.get("https://example.com/")
    .render(true)
    .result();

// Multiple parameters
String html = client.get("https://example.com/")
    .render(true)
    .countryCode("us")
    .result();

Decision Guide

Situation	Approach
Single URL, synchronous	.get(url).<params>.result()
Page loads content via JavaScript	Chain .render(true)
Site blocks datacenter proxies	Chain .premium(true)
Toughest anti-bot protection	Chain .ultraPremium(true)
Multi-step / paginated flow on same domain	Chain .sessionNumber(n)
Transient failures expected	Chain .retry(n)
20+ URLs or batch jobs	Async endpoint via HttpClient
Supported platform (Amazon, Google, etc.)	Structured data endpoint

Parameter Reference

Rendering

// Render JavaScript before returning HTML
// Use when: page is a React/Vue/Angular SPA, or initial scrape returns empty content
// Cost: +10 credits
String html = client.get("https://spa-site.com/").render(true).result();

// Wait for a DOM element before capturing (requires render)
String html = client.get("https://spa-site.com/")
    .render(true)
    .waitForSelector(".product-list")
    .result();