Apowersoft Free Screen Capture vs Browshot

Apowersoft Free Screen Capture captures visible screen content, including selected regions, active windows, drop-down menus, webpages, video frames, and gameplay. Users can start with the camera icon or Print Screen key; the tool detects application windows as the pointer moves over them. A quick editor adds lines, arrows, text, shapes, or blur to cover sensitive information. Captures can be saved as JPG, PNG, TIFF, BMP, GIF, or PDF. Sharing options include copying to the clipboard, emailing, uploading to Screenshot.net, or sharing to listed social networks; uploads receive links, and the product page says free cloud space is provided. The web-based tool does not need Java Applet, but first-time users must install a launcher. It is listed as free, with a free plan for unlimited screenshots after launcher installation. The listed platforms are web, Windows, and macOS. Apowersoft Free Screen Capture is headquartered in Hong Kong, and the maker was founded in 2010.

Browshot is a web service for taking real-time screenshots of live websites through a dashboard or API. It supports more than 30 virtual browsers, including mobile and desktop choices, and can capture screen or full-page views as well as thumbnails. Requested output can be PNG or JPEG, with specified viewport dimensions and thumbnail size and aspect ratio. Browshot uses real desktop and mobile browsers that support HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript, image loading, and redirects. Its REST API uses an API key; open-source libraries are available for Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, and C#, with Swagger specifications for generating other clients. Premium and private browsers can perform actions such as navigation, clicking, typing, JavaScript execution, and screenshots. Trackers can extract page values, and screenshots can be sent to Amazon S3 or hosted by Browshot over HTTPS. The free plan provides 100 screenshots per month with reduced browser and resolution choices and shared browsers. Paid plans start at $1 a month. Average screenshot completion, including page load, is about 15 seconds; pages taking over two minutes are aborted without charge for failed screenshots.