cURL vs. wget: Which one is better for you?

When you want to download files directly through the Linux command line, two tools can immediately come to mind: wget and cURL. They have many of the same characteristics and can easily accomplish some of the same tasks. Although they have some similar characteristics, they are not exactly the same. These two programs are suitable for different situations and have their own characteristics in specific situations.

cURL vs wget: Similarities

Both wget and cURL can download content. This is how they are designed at their core. They can both send requests to the Internet and return requested items. This can be a file, image, or something else like the raw HTML of the website.

Both programs can make HTTP POST requests. This means they can all send data to the website, such as filling out forms.

Since both are command line tools, they are designed to be scriptable. Both wget and cURL can be written into your Bash scripts to automatically interact with new content and download what you need.

Advantages of wget

wget is simple and straightforward. This means you can enjoy its exceptional download speeds. wget is an independent program, does not require additional resource libraries, and does not do anything outside its scope.

wget is a professional direct download program that supports recursive downloads. At the same time, it also allows you to download any content in a web page or FTP directory.

wget has smart default settings. It specifies how to handle many things in regular browsers, such as cookies and redirects, without requiring additional configuration. It can be said that wget is simply self-explanatory and ready to eat out of the can!

cURL Advantages

cURL is a versatile tool. Sure, it can download web content, but it can also do much more.

cURL technical support library is: libcurl. This means that you can write an entire program based on cURL, allowing you to write a downloader program based on the graphical environment in the libcurl library and access all its functionality.

cURL Broad network protocol support may be its biggest selling point. cURL supports access to HTTP and HTTPS protocols and can handle FTP transfers. It supports LDAP protocol and even supports Samba sharing. In fact, you can also use cURL to send and receive emails.

cURL also has some neat security features. cURL supports the installation of many SSL/TLS libraries and also supports access through network proxies, including SOCKS. This means that you can use cURL over Tor.

cURL also supports gzip compression technology that makes sending data easier.

Thinking summary

So should you use cURL or wget? This comparison depends on the actual use. If you want fast downloads and don't have to worry about parameter identification, then you should use wget, which is lightweight and efficient. If you want to do some more complex usage, your intuition tells you that you should choose cRUL.

cURL allows you to do many things. You can think of cURL as a stripped-down command-line web browser. It supports almost every protocol you can think of and provides interactive access to almost any online content. The only difference from a browser is that cURL does not render the corresponding information it receives.

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