Updated: 2026-10-27
Type in a domain. See what the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine kept of it: the old design, the URL structure and a few sample pages. This Internet Archive downloader starts free, with no pile of files to sort through.
Wayback Press is independent and not affiliated with the Internet Archive. The scan reads the archive’s public data; everything shown comes from there.
What the scan shows
- The old design. A preview of how the site looked, so you can tell at a glance whether this is the version you remember.
- The URL structure. The tree of pages the archive holds for the domain: sections, posts, pages. This is the map any restore is built from.
- A few sample pages or posts. Enough to see whether the text and template survived.
What the scan does not do
- It is not the full download. The scan looks at a few pages per run. For the complete site, use our free GitHub tool or a paid restore.
- It does not fill gaps. If the archive never captured a page or an image, the scan cannot show it. The Internet Archive’s help pages say not every date for every archived site is complete (Internet Archive Help Center).
- It is rate-limited. The Internet Archive is a public, non-profit resource that can throttle bulk access, and its documentation gives no request-rate figure, only a cap on results per query (Internet Archive, CDX server documentation). So the free scan stays small.
If you are new to the archive itself, our guide on “How does the Wayback Machine work?” explains snapshots, the calendar view and why some captures look broken.
Why a raw download often breaks
Downloading a website from the Wayback Machine sounds like one step. In practice the archive is not one copy of your site; it is thousands of captures taken at different times, each saved whenever a crawler happened to pass.
The Internet Archive’s public index lists every capture of a domain, each with the original URL, a timestamp, the content type, the status code and a content digest (Wayback CDX Server API, Internet Archive on GitHub). A raw download copies those captures as they are, so what you get is what the archive held:
- Mixed snapshots: the header from one year, the article from another.
- Missing assets: stylesheets, scripts and images that were never archived, so pages render half-styled.
- Duplicate versions of the same page under slightly different URLs.
- Junk and spam pages that crept in over the years, sometimes from a later owner.
- Wrong-era content: if the domain changed hands, the newest capture may not be your site at all.
None of that is the downloader’s fault. It is faithfully copying what is there. Someone still has to choose the right capture per page and throw the junk away.
Free, then paid: the honest split
| Free scan (this page) | Free GitHub downloader | Paid AI-checked restore | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What you get | Design preview, URL tree, a few sample pages | The full archived site as HTML or WordPress files | A working site, HTML or editable WordPress, checked page by page |
| Who runs it | We do, in the browser | You, on your own machine | My agents, then a human reviewer |
| Snapshot choice | n/a | Automatic, no review | Best snapshot picked per page |
| Junk and spam pages | n/a | Downloaded with the rest | Dropped and listed in the report |
| URL structure | Shown | Kept as archived | Kept; anything that can’t stay gets a 301 map |
| Price | Free | Free, open source | From $49 per site, up to 300 URLs (pricing) |
The free tools work. The paid difference is the LLM quality check (design and every page reviewed, layout breaks fixed, junk dropped, errors flagged) and the fact that it is done for you.
The paid restore, briefly
Scan → best snapshot per page → rebuild → LLM check → human review → delivery
You can take the result as clean HTML, or restore to editable WordPress so the site has a real editor and database again. If you lost the site to a closed host or an expired account, the full website recovery from the Wayback Machine page covers the whole process, domain side included.
A few plain limits:
- You must have the rights to the content you restore; the terms explain this.
- No ranking promises. A restore gives you pages, URLs and redirects back; what Google does next is Google’s call.
- No client reviews yet. The two case studies so far are internal tests; client deliveries become case studies only with the client’s written consent.
Restore prices depend on the size of the site; see pricing.
Common questions
Can’t I just ask the Internet Archive for a copy?
No. Its help page says it can no longer offer to pack up sites that have been lost, and its “Save Page Now” feature does not save entire sites (Internet Archive Help Center).
Do I need an account to scan?
No. You do not need to enter an email address to see scan results.
The scan shows almost nothing. Now what?
Then the archive holds little for that domain, and no tool, free or paid, can restore what was never captured. Better to know that before you spend anything.
A scan costs you a minute. Finding out after the download costs you an evening.
Wayback Press (waybackpress.com) is an independent restoration service. Not affiliated with the Internet Archive or the Wayback Machine, nor with the Shift8 open-source “WaybackPress” command-line tool of the same name.