Manga Scraper

Download manga chapters from MangaBat (mangabats.com) directly via CDN — bypasses Cloudflare. Triggered when user asks to download/scrape manga chapters or manga images.

MangaBat Scraper

Download manga chapters directly from MangaBats CDN without hitting Cloudflare protection. Auto-falls back to Playwright (headless browser) when CDN is IP-blocked.

How It Works

CDN Method (default): MangaBat serves images from storage.waitst.com — CDN is unprotected. Pattern: https://storage.waitst.com/zin/[slug]/[chapter]/[page].webp

Browser Fallback: If CDN is IP-blocked, script launches Playwright (headless Chromium) to extract image URLs directly from the chapter page JavaScript.

Script Location

Locate the script in your skills directory:

find ~ -name manga_scraper.py 2>/dev/null

Setup Check

python3 /path/to/manga_scraper.py --help

Setup (One-Time)

Required for CDN mode only (default):

# Nothing! Uses stdlib only — urllib + concurrent.futures

Required for browser fallback (optional):

pip install playwright && playwright install chromium

Usage

Single chapter (CDN, fast):

python3 manga_scraper.py "https://www.mangabats.com/manga/[manga-slug]/chapter-5"

Single chapter + force Playwright fallback (for IP-blocked networks):

python3 manga_scraper.py "https://www.mangabats.com/manga/[manga-slug]/chapter-5" \
  --fallback-browser

Chapter range (1–10):

python3 manga_scraper.py "https://www.mangabats.com/manga/[manga-slug]" \
  --start 1 --end 10 --workers 4

All chapters (auto-detect last by 404 scan):

python3 manga_scraper.py "https://www.mangabats.com/manga/[manga-slug]" \
  --all --workers 3

Skip browser fallback (faster, for CI):

python3 manga_scraper.py "..." --no-browser

Custom output folder:

python3 manga_scraper.py "URL" --output ~/Manga/MyManga

Flags

Flag	Description
--all	Download all chapters (manga URL, auto-detects last by 404 scan)
--start N	Start from chapter N
--end N	End at chapter N
--workers N	Concurrent downloads, default 3
--output -o	Output directory, default ./downloads/
--fallback-browser	Force Playwright fallback (for IP-blocked networks)
--no-browser	Skip Playwright fallback entirely (faster, CI/CD)

CDN Fallback Chain

If one CDN fails, script tries the next automatically:

1. storage.waitst.com — current default (/zin/[slug]/[ch]/[page].webp)
2. img-r1.2xstorage.com — legacy (/[slug]/[ch]/[page].webp)
3. img-2xcdn.com — fallback (/[slug]/[ch]/[page].webp)

If all CDNs return 403 → auto-activates Playwright fallback (installs Chromium once).

Output

• Saves to chapter_NNN/page_000.webp naming convention
• Resume support: skips existing files
• Some pages may be missing (MangaBat sometimes removes individual pages — placeholder is ~14 bytes, skipped automatically)
• Image format: .webp

Troubleshooting

Problem	Solution
0/0 downloaded — all 403	IP blocked. Use --fallback-browser or activate VPN
0/0 downloaded — all 000	No internet. Check connection
playwright import error	Run: pip install playwright && playwright install chromium
Missing pages (14 bytes each)	Normal — MangaBat removes pages from CDN sometimes
Script breaks in future	Run with --fallback-browser — browser always works

Notes

• Script is pure Python stdlib (urllib + concurrent.futures) for CDN mode
• Playwright fallback requires Chromium (~150MB download, one-time)
• Be respectful: use --workers 3 or lower for batch downloads
• Mangabat rotates CDNs every few months — current CDN is storage.waitst.com