Alternatives to GNU Wget
A non-interactive command-line tool for retrieving files over HTTP, HTTPS, FTP and FTPS. The listings below can replace it for an important use case. Each note says what changes if you switch.
The original
GNU Wget
A non-interactive command-line tool for retrieving files over HTTP, HTTPS, FTP and FTPS.
Replacements
Listings that take over the same core job as GNU Wget.
GNU Wget2
Successor to Wget with HTTP/2, parallel connections and compression.
GNU Wget2 is the GPL-3.0 successor with HTTP/2, parallel connections and compression for faster mirroring, keeping the command line, although some Wget options are missing.
aria2
A command line downloader that pulls one file from several sources at once, including a torrent and a mirror together.
aria2 is a GPL-2.0 command-line tool that pulls one file from HTTP, FTP and BitTorrent sources at once and offers a JSON-RPC daemon, but lacks recursive mirroring.
Axel
Lightweight command-line download accelerator that fetches one file over several connections at once.
Axel is a lightweight Linux command-line accelerator using several connections per file, but it has no recursive mirroring and no Windows or macOS listing.
HTTrack
A free website copier that downloads whole sites to a local folder for offline browsing.
HTTrack is a GPL website copier focused on offline mirrors, with updates of existing copies and WARC output, replacing Wget's recursive mode rather than its single-file downloads.
Also worth comparing
These listings name GNU Wget as their own alternative, so the relationship runs both ways.
Cyotek WebCopy
A free Windows tool that copies all or part of a website to a local drive.
GNU Wget is free and open source under GPL-3.0 and mirrors sites recursively with link conversion, but it is command line only.
Offline Explorer
A Windows website downloader and offline browser for archiving pages and whole sites.
GNU Wget is free and open source under GPL-3.0 with recursive mirroring and link conversion, but it is used from the command line only.
SiteSucker
A Mac app that downloads whole websites to disk for offline browsing.
GNU Wget is free and open source, runs on macOS, Linux and Windows, and mirrors sites with link conversion from the command line only.
Similar software
Related functionality, not a direct replacement.
gallery-dl
A command-line program that downloads image galleries and collections from many image hosting sites.
Persepolis
A download manager built on aria2 that splits a file across up to sixty-four connections and schedules queues.
KGet
KDE's download manager for HTTP and FTP with pause, resume and Metalink support.
