Scraping Images

Scraping the images & photos from a website follows a similar approach as the other examples. All graphics such as images, photos and infographics can be parsed with details such as tag attributes or only as an URL list.

Scraping Image URLs

The following example parses a web-page for images and returns absolute image URLs as an array.

$web = new \spekulatius\phpscraper();

/**
 * Navigate to the test page. This page contains two images:
 *
 * <img src="https://test-pages.phpscraper.de/assets/cat.jpg" alt="absolute path">
 * <img src="/assets/cat.jpg" alt="relative path">
 */
$web->go('https://test-pages.phpscraper.de/meta/lorem-ipsum.html');

// Check if any images have been found
$images = $web->images;
if (count($images) > 0) {

    var_dump($images);
    /**
     * [
     *     'https://test-pages.phpscraper.de/assets/cat.jpg',
     *     'https://test-pages.phpscraper.de/assets/cat.jpg',
     * ]
     *
     * Note:
     * Double because it's twice the same image:
     * Once with a relative path and once with an absolute path.
     * The relative paths are resolved to absolute paths by default.
     */
}

TIP

If no images are found, the array remains empty.

Scraping Images with Details

If you are in need of more details the following requests allows you to access attributes of the image tag:

$web = new \spekulatius\phpscraper();
$web->go('https://test-pages.phpscraper.de/meta/lorem-ipsum.html');

var_dump($web->imagesWithDetails);
/**
 * [
 *     'url' => 'https://test-pages.phpscraper.de/assets/cat.jpg',
 *     'alt' => 'absolute path',
 *     'width' => null,
 *     'height' => null,
 * ],
 * [
 *     'url' => 'https://test-pages.phpscraper.de/assets/cat.jpg',
 *     'alt' => 'relative path',
 *     'width' => null,
 *     'height' => null,
 * ]
 */

SEO

The alt-text (with the keywords of the content) is used by search engines for image-based searches. Make sure to always define it.

Scraping Attributes: Alt, Width and Height

The attributes for alt, width and height are included in the detailed data set.

If you require more data, you will either need to extend the library or submit an issue for consideration.