Top 10 WhatRuns Alternatives for Determining What a Website is Built With

Top 10 WhatRuns Alternatives for Determining What a Website is Built With

Need a WhatRuns alternative? Check out these top 10 tools to quickly identify the technologies powering websites and optimize your tech analysis.

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Do not index
Do not index
You’ve been cruising along, building a solid pipeline for your business, when out of nowhere, a prospect tells you they don’t need your solution because they just invested in a competing product. You feel that sinking sensation in your gut. After all, you’ve worked hard to get that lead on the phone, and now you’re left with nothing to show. What if you had known about the website technology they were using before you ever reached out? WhatRuns could have given you the information to tailor your approach and overcome this unexpected objection. In this article, we’ll discuss WhatRuns and how it can be helpful for B2B sales prospecting. We’ll also look at top WhatRuns alternatives to help you achieve your sales goals.
If you want an excellent tool to help you assess a prospect's website technology before you reach out, check out Aomni's website technology checker. This simple tool can help you identify a website's technology in seconds so you can get back to crafting that perfect sales email.

What is WhatRuns and How Does it Work?

WhatRuns
WhatRuns
WhatRuns is a free Google Chrome extension that lets you discover what technologies are used on any website you visit. From server software and analytics tools to programming languages and content management systems, WhatRuns provides a wealth of information at your fingertips.

How to Use WhatRuns: Installation

You’ll need to install the WhatRuns extension. To do so, go to the Google Chrome Web Store, search for “WhatRuns,” and click “Add to Chrome.”

Using WhatRuns: Exploring a Website

Once installed, visit any website you're curious about. Click the WhatRuns icon on your browser toolbar (it will turn blue when you visit a website).

Understanding the Results

A sidebar will appear on the right side of your browser, revealing all the technologies used on the website. These are typically categorized into different sections, such as:
  • Frameworks
  • Programming Languages
  • CMS
  • Web Servers
  • CDN and more
Clicking on any technology will give you a more detailed explanation.
WhatRuns also provides a unique feature allowing you to follow websites. If the site updates its technology stack, you will get a notification. This can be especially useful for web developers and tech enthusiasts looking to stay updated with their favorite sites' technology trends.

Limitations of WhatRuns: Understanding Its Scope and Alternatives for Deeper Web Technology Insights

While WhatRuns provides an excellent starting point for understanding a website’s architecture, it may not capture every detail, as some technologies could be hidden or customized. It’s a handy tool for anyone interested in exploring the world of web technology.

Pros and Cons Of Using WhatRuns

WhatRuns
WhatRuns

The Pros of Using WhatRuns

WhatRuns excels at detecting technology. The platform can identify various website technologies, including:
  • Advertising tags
  • Analytics tools
Its comprehensive detection covers multiple elements, from fonts to themes (including tens of thousands). This thorough analysis proves beneficial for any sales team that wants to understand the what and how behind a site’s tech.

Track Changes and Keep Tabs on Competitors

A standout feature of WhatRuns is its ability to follow websites. If you’re watching competitors or learning from the pros, this lets you see what new tools they adopt—or abandon. It’s like having a front-row seat to their tech evolution. For sales teams, this can provide valuable insight into how target companies operate and what technologies their teams use to function more effectively.

Lightweight and Intuitive User Interface

Compared to similar tools, WhatRuns is lightweight and doesn’t bog down your browser. The clean and user-friendly interface makes it easy to navigate, even for those new to website analysis. If you’re looking for a tool that’s simple to use, WhatRuns fits the bill.

The Cons of Using WhatRuns

Limited Depth for Tech Stack Analysis

While WhatRuns is great at spotting many technologies, it falls short when providing a detailed breakdown of a site’s tech stack. If you need in-depth insights, you might find WhatRuns lacking.

Stagnant Development and Updates

Here’s a red flag: WhatRuns hasn’t been updated in over three years. This means it might struggle to keep up with newer technologies, which could limit its usefulness as the web evolves.

Reliability Issues and Inconsistent Accuracy

Users have reported occasional hiccups like the extension not working correctly or crashing. When reliability is key, this can be a dealbreaker. While it’s generally reliable, there are instances where WhatRuns misidentifies technologies or shows incomplete data.
This can be frustrating, mainly if you rely on the information for serious decisions.

Maximizing B2B Sales Success with Aomni: AI-Powered Tools for Account-Based Strategies

Aomni is an AI agent platform designed specifically for B2B sales intelligence software. Our solution empowers enterprise and strategic account executives to execute account-based sales and marketing strategies with unprecedented efficiency and effectiveness.
Our key features include:
  • AI-powered prospect and account research
  • Comprehensive account mapping and planning
  • Data-driven sales strategy development
  • Automated call preparation
  • Personalized AI agents for sales optimization
  • AI chat interface for streamlined sales processes
  • AI-assisted Account Based Sales/Marketing campaign execution tool
Aomni addresses critical pain points for sales managers whose Account Executives, Account Managers, and Customer Success Managers must perform better and include quotas. By leveraging our advanced AI technology, sales professionals can significantly enhance their preparation for customer conversations, leading to the following:
  • Larger deal closures
  • Increased promotion opportunities
For individual sales professionals, Aomni provides the tools and insights needed to:
  • Elevate their performance
  • Close more substantial deals
  • Accelerate career progression
Our platform transforms how B2B sales teams operate, ensuring they enter every customer interaction fully prepared and strategically positioned for success. Try our sales intelligence software and our website technology checker for free today!

Top 10 WhatRuns Alternatives For Determining What A Website Is Built With

1. Aomni: Your Secret Weapon for Sales Intelligence

WhatRuns
WhatRuns
Aomni is an AI agent platform designed specifically for B2B sales intelligence software. Our solution empowers enterprise and strategic account executives to execute account-based sales and marketing strategies with unprecedented efficiency and effectiveness.
Our key features include:
  • AI-powered prospect and account research
  • Comprehensive account mapping and planning
  • Data-driven sales strategy development
  • Automated call preparation
  • Personalized AI agents for sales optimization
  • AI chat interface for streamlined sales processes
  • AI-assisted Account Based Sales/Marketing campaign execution tool
Aomni addresses critical pain points for sales managers whose Account Executives, Account Managers, and Customer Success Managers must perform better and include quotas. By leveraging our advanced AI technology, sales professionals can significantly enhance their preparation for customer conversations, leading to the following:
  • Larger deal closures
  • Increased promotion opportunities
For individual sales professionals, Aomni provides the tools and insights needed to:
  • Elevate their performance
  • Close more substantial deals
  • Accelerate career progression
Our platform transforms how B2B sales teams operate, ensuring they enter every customer interaction fully prepared and strategically positioned for success. Try our sales intelligence software and our website technology checker for free today!

2. Wappalyzer: The Ultimate WhatRuns Alternative

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Wappalyzer has been marketed as an alternative to WhatRuns. And it’s not just in marketing. The team has done a good job developing the product as well. Wappalyzer tracks thousands of websites and technologies and builds lists with up-to-date information.
It has robust features that offer technographic insights to improve lead generation strategies. Apart from technology lookup, they allow you to:
  • Create lead lists
  • Keyword research
  • Website alerts to track changes

Exploring Wappalyzer’s Features: Intuitive UI, Alerts, and Scalable Integrations for Tech Stack Analysis

Main Features of Wappalyzer
  • Simple UI: Despite all the features, Wappalyzer does a good job of providing an intuitive user experience. You can quickly search for a website to see all the tech stack and company details.
  • Website alerts: Wappalyzer allows you to monitor a website and stay up-to-date with all the changes. This is a great way to track competitors.
  • Scalable: Apart from lookup, Wappalyzer offers scalable app integrations and mobile apps for convenience.

3. Netcraft: A Veteran in the Field

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Netcraft is one of the oldest names on this list. Over the years, they’ve churned out quality security tools, including a website profiler called “What’s the site running?” Netcraft Site Report uses data mining to find a website’s backend infrastructure and security protocols.
Main Features of Netcraft
  • Detailed report: Netcraft offers one of the most thorough security reports I’ve ever come across. Since their domain is security and compliance, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a better option.
  • IP Geolocation: Many tech lookup tools don’t share IP Geolocation, which can be used to track servers. At the same time, this is a pretty noble decision; Netcraft shares Geolocation.
  • Hosting history: Netcraft tracks the Netblock owner and a website’s hosting records.

4. SimilarTech: The Lead Generation Powerhouse

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SimilarTech is sales intelligence software with a proven lead generation and market research history. This no-fuss tool quickly lets you check specific technologies or websites.
Main Features of SimilarTech
  • Both technology and website report: SimilarTech has made gaining insights easy. You can find results based on a particular technology or the tech stack used by a website.
  • Technology comparison: SimilarTech can compare two technologies. This is very useful if you’re unsure which one to pick for your business. For instance, I found their PayPal vs Stripe report insightful.
  • Vast scraping data: SimilarTech scans almost 30 billion web pages each month for comprehensive analysis

5. Rescan: The Simple Tech Lookup Tool

Rescan is a stripped-down tech lookup tool that gets the job done quickly. This tech profiling tool was previously known as Allora. Still, a rebrand has done a much better job of relating to their target audience of those looking for a WhatRuns alternative that’s more modern and up-to-date.
Main Features of Rescan
  • Easy to use: Rescan doesn’t come with extra bells and whistles. Instead, it focuses on providing a simple and easy user experience.
  • Works as a website and technology lookup tool: Rescan allows you to check technology trends and market share with great visuals and simultaneously observe a website’s tech stack.

6. Hunter TechLookup: The Free WhatRuns Alternative

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Hunter TechLookup is one of the best WhatRuns alternatives you’ll find today. It’s powered by Hunter, an industry-leading email lookup and outreach tool I’ve used for many years, so I was excited when they launched this new profiling tool.
Main Features of Hunter
  • TechLookup Easy to use: Hunter TechLookup uses a sleek and minimalist UI that’s easy to navigate. You can pick your technology from the listed categories and quickly check the websites, categories, and languages.
  • Create your list: Hunter TechLookup lets you build your list to export and use later. You can narrow down searches to the granular level, tweak the website categories and languages, and use the unique popularity metric to include websites based on their popularity.
  • Free tool: TechLookup allows you to search for technology and gain insights for free, which is one of its most attractive features. You’ll see the first 5,000 websites for free in your custom list, but with a premium plan, you can go as high as 50,000 websites! I’ve found the free plan to be adequate for most use cases.
  • Part of Hunter ecosystem: Hunter scrapes the internet to find email addresses and guess secret ones with great accuracy.

Leveraging Hunter for Effective Email Prospecting and List Verification

I use Hunter to find prospects’ emails and verify my email list. Hunter’s scraping DNA has given TechLookup a decisive edge over its competitors. The company has also expanded the Hunter suite of products with:
  • Chrome
  • Firefox
  • Google Sheet add-ons
  • Email campaign automation

7. W3Techs: The Technology Research Company

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W3Techs is a web technology survey and research company. They maintain a database of information on the specific technology tools used on websites. This includes things such as:
  • Which CMS is used
  • Which programming languages are used
  • Frontend technology and so on
W3Techs provides technology information to help website owners make informed decisions about the web technologies they use and to help website developers track trends in web technology usage.

Unlocking Sales Intelligence with W3Techs Insights: A Comprehensive Tool for Tech Stack and Market Research

Why Use W3Techs? W3Techs also offers a paid service called W3Techs Insights, which provides details, all of which can be very beneficial for your sales team:
  • Data on website technology usage data
  • Tech stack
  • Technology shortcuts
It covers website technologies, mobile apps, web server software, and programming languages, making it a more comprehensive resource for research purposes.
W3Techs provides data on the percentage of websites using that technology and the top 10 users of technology stacks. This level of detail regarding technology stacks can be beneficial when understanding how popular a particular technology is and tracking technology trends.
W3Techs is updated more frequently than WhatRuns. This is important because the world of website technologies is constantly changing. Without real-time data, you need access to at least the most up-to-date data to make decisions based on technology profiling.

8. Competera: The New Kid on the Block

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A new website on the block is shaking things up in web development. It's called Competera, and it's one of the best WhatRuns alternatives to track live websites. Competera is a technology lookup website that allows you to find out which website builder a site is using and other information about the technology behind it.

Why Choose Competera Over BuiltWith: A Comprehensive Tool for E-Commerce and Technology Profiling

Why Use Competera? The answer is simple: Competera is a better version of Builtwith. Competera offers more comprehensive features, including data on all major hosting providers, e-commerce technologies, and operating systems.
This profiling tool includes everything from web development to marketing to e-commerce, while builtwith.com only offers web development.

Leveraging Competera’s Traffic Insights: Real-Time Data for Sales and Marketing Strategy

Competera includes website traffic data from Alexa and SimilarWeb. This can be helpful if you are trying to gauge the popularity of a particular website and empower your sales and marketing teams.
Their team of expert web crawlers constantly analyzes the internet to gather data, so you can be sure that the information in the database is always up-to-date and accurate. This platform is more user-friendly and easier to navigate than builtwith.com.

9. SimilarTech: The Website Profiling Platform

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SimilarTech is a powerful website profiling platform that provides similar information about website technology. If you’re looking for WhatRuns alternatives, SimilarTech is an excellent option. SimilarTech provides similar website data and insights but offers a few key advantages. SimilarTech focuses on technology adoption, spanning 30 billion scanned pages per month.
Their historical website traffic data goes much further to 2007, so if you're interested in trends, SimilarTech is the better choice. SimilarTech’s user interface is more intuitive and easy to use than BuiltWith. Simply enter a website URL into the search bar and get information about that website in seconds.

10. WhatCMS: The CMS Technology Detector

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WhatCMS.org is a website that allows users to input a URL and get information about the content management system (CMS) with which the site is built. It also provides CMS detection for over 1,000+ different systems.
WhatCMS is an excellent tool for developers who want to learn more about how different CMSs work or for businesses who want to determine which CMS their competitors use. Either way, WhatCMS can be a valuable resource. WhatCMS is available as a web app and as a downloadable PHP script. The web app is the easiest way to start, but the PHP script offers more features and flexibility.

Choosing The Best Tool For Determining What A Website Is Built With

WhatRuns
WhatRuns

Accuracy: The Foundation of a Good Website Analysis Tool

Accuracy forms the base of any good website analysis tool. It defeats its purpose if the tool frequently misidentifies technologies or overlooks key components. Whether you’re scouting a competitor’s site or planning a similar project, you need reliable information you can trust. After all, guessing doesn’t help when precision is the goal.

Coverage: Look For a Robust Tool That Detects a Wide Range of Technologies

Websites today are built with a mix of popular tools, like WordPress or Shopify, and more niche frameworks or custom scripts. A robust tool should cover this entire spectrum. The more technologies it can detect, the more comprehensive your analysis will be. You don’t want to miss out because the tool has a limited library of recognized tech.

Ease of Use: Make Sure the Tool Is User Friendly

Not everyone diving into website tech is a seasoned developer. That’s why ease of use matters. A good tool should have an intuitive interface that works whether you’re a tech pro or a curious user. If you have to spend hours figuring out how the tool works, it’s probably not worth your time.

Real-Time Updates: Choose a Tool That Keeps Up With the Rapidly Changing Digital World

The digital world evolves fast—new frameworks emerge, plugins get updated, and old tools fade away. A website analysis tool that keeps up with these changes will always be more valuable. The tool risks becoming obsolete without regular updates, leaving you in the dark about the latest technologies.

Depth of Analysis: Pick a Tool That Fits Your Goals

Here’s where you decide what you need. Are you looking for a quick snapshot, like “Oh, this site uses WordPress”? Or do you want a deep dive into server configurations, APIs, and analytics setups? The level of detail you’re after should guide your choice of tool. Some tools give you a surface-level overview, while others are built for serious tech sleuthing.

Try Our Website Technology Checker for Free Today

Aomni is an AI agent platform designed specifically for B2B sales intelligence software. Our solution empowers enterprise and strategic account executives to execute account-based sales and marketing strategies with unprecedented efficiency and effectiveness.
Our key features include:
  • AI-powered prospect and account research
  • Comprehensive account mapping and planning
  • Data-driven sales strategy development
  • Automated call preparation
  • Personalized AI agents for sales optimization
  • AI chat interface for streamlined sales processes
  • AI-assisted Account Based Sales/Marketing campaign execution tool
Aomni addresses critical pain points for sales managers whose Account Executives, Account Managers, and Customer Success Managers must perform better and include quotas. By leveraging our advanced AI technology, sales professionals can significantly enhance their preparation for customer conversations, leading to the following:
  • Larger deal closures
  • Increased promotion opportunities
For individual sales professionals, Aomni provides the tools and insights needed to:
  • Elevate their performance
  • Close more substantial deals
  • Accelerate career progression
Our platform transforms how B2B sales teams operate, ensuring they enter every customer interaction fully prepared and strategically positioned for success. Try our sales intelligence software and our website technology checker for free today!

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Written by

David Zhang
David Zhang

Founder & CEO at Aomni