lightpanda-io/browser

What is it?

Key features

• 01Runs JavaScript with V8 and parses HTML with html5ever
• 02Serves a CDP WebSocket endpoint compatible with Puppeteer and Playwright
• 03Supports WebDriver BiDi alongside CDP
• 04Dumps pages as HTML, Markdown, PNG, PDF or structured data
• 05Provides an MCP server with isolated browsing sessions
• 06Includes an agent mode that exports replayable JavaScript scripts

Use cases

• Running large numbers of headless browser instances for AI agent web tasks
• Scraping or crawling JavaScript-heavy pages with lower memory use than headless Chrome
• Connecting existing Puppeteer or Playwright scripts to a lighter browser backend
• Giving LLM agents browsing tools through MCP

Quick start

1. 1

   Install via Homebrew (nightly)

   brew install lightpanda-io/browser/lightpanda
2. 2

   Dump a URL as HTML

   ./lightpanda fetch --obey-robots --dump html --log-format pretty --log-level info https://demo-browser.lightpanda.io/campfire-commerce/
3. 3

   Start a CDP server on port 9222

   ./lightpanda serve --obey-robots --log-format pretty --log-level info --host 127.0.0.1 --port 9222

Things to know

• !Linux and macOS only; Windows requires WSL2 and there is no Android build.
• !Linux release binaries need glibc, so musl distributions like Alpine are not supported by the prebuilt binary.
• !Licensed under AGPL-3.0, a copyleft license with network-use obligations.
• !Building from source requires Zig 0.15.2, V8, and Rust, which is a heavy setup.

Topics

FAQ

What is browser?

A headless browser written in Zig from scratch for AI agents and automation, with CDP and WebDriver BiDi servers. Lightpanda is a headless browser built for AI agents and web automation. It is not based on Chromium, Blink or WebKit. It runs JavaScript, parses HTML with html5ever, loads pages over libcurl and exposes the DOM, so it can fetch and render pages without a graphical engine.

Is browser free to use? What license does it have?

browser is open source under the AGPL-3.0 license. Check the license terms before using it in commercial products.

Is browser still maintained?

Actively maintained. The last commit to browser was on Oct 20, 2026.

What can I use browser for?

Running large numbers of headless browser instances for AI agent web tasks Scraping or crawling JavaScript-heavy pages with lower memory use than headless Chrome Connecting existing Puppeteer or Playwright scripts to a lighter browser backend Giving LLM agents browsing tools through MCP

How do I install browser?

Install via Homebrew (nightly): brew install lightpanda-io/browser/lightpanda Dump a URL as HTML: ./lightpanda fetch --obey-robots --dump html --log-format pretty --log-level info https://demo-browser.lightpanda.io/campfire-commerce/ Start a CDP server on port 9222: ./lightpanda serve --obey-robots --log-format pretty --log-level info --host 127.0.0.1 --port 9222

Where can I get browser?

The source code and installation instructions are on GitHub: https://github.com/lightpanda-io/browser