Our mission
Make the past of the web more accessible and useful. Whether you’re checking how a site looked during a launch, researching UI history, or debugging a regression across time—Crawl aims to make it effortless.
What it does
- Loads the earliest available snapshot for a domain and lets you jump year-by-year.
- Shows captures in a clean viewer with browser-like controls (tabs, back/forward, reload).
- Surfaces errors gently when snapshots are missing or fail, especially during beta.
How it works (at a glance)
Crawl fetches available capture timestamps for a given domain from archival sources, then loads the corresponding snapshot URL into the viewer. We don’t claim ownership of third-party content shown in snapshots. Availability depends on what the archives hold for that domain and date.
Note: During beta, capture coverage and reliability can vary by site.
Principles
Honor rate limits, source policies, and attribution where appropriate.
Fast UI, minimal friction, sensible fallbacks when snapshots fail.
Simple controls, thoughtful messaging, and accessible defaults.
Project timeline
- Prototype: core viewer, year jump, basic error handling.
- Beta: UI polish, mobile fixes, legal pages, contact flow.
- Upcoming: refinements to navigation and snapshot indexing; additional quality-of-life features.
Team & credits
Stack.WS is a small project with outsized help from open-source tools and the broader web archiving community. If you maintain infrastructure that enables this project, thank you.
FAQ
Does Crawl host snapshots?
No. It provides a viewer and navigation over existing archival sources.
Why is a particular page missing?
Capture availability depends on the archives. Some sites opt out or were never crawled on certain dates.
Can I request a takedown?
If content displayed via the viewer raises a rights concern, contact us and/or the archive hosting the snapshot. See our Terms.
Press & assets
Need a logo or a brief description? Use the brand mark below and credit “Crawl”.
Crawl — “Explore historical snapshots of the web.”
Have feedback or want to say hi?
We’d love to hear how you’re using Crawl.