Lightpanda Browser

# Lightpanda — Headless Browser for AI & Automation

> Skill by [ara.so](https://ara.so) — Daily 2026 Skills collection

Lightpanda is a headless browser built from scratch in Zig, designed for AI agents, web scraping, and automation. It uses 9x less memory and runs 11x faster than Chrome headless.

**Key facts:**
- Not based on Chromium, Blink, or WebKit — clean-slate Zig implementation
- JavaScript execution via V8 engine
- CDP (Chrome DevTools Protocol) compatible — works with Playwright, Puppeteer, chromedp
- Respects `robots.txt` via `--obey_robots` flag
- Beta status, actively developed
- License: AGPL-3.0

## Installation

### macOS (Apple Silicon)

```bash
curl -L -o lightpanda https://github.com/lightpanda-io/browser/releases/download/nightly/lightpanda-aarch64-macos
chmod a+x ./lightpanda
```

### Linux (x86_64)

```bash
curl -L -o lightpanda https://github.com/lightpanda-io/browser/releases/download/nightly/lightpanda-x86_64-linux
chmod a+x ./lightpanda
```

### Docker

```bash
# Supports amd64 and arm64
docker run -d --name lightpanda -p 9222:9222 lightpanda/browser:nightly
```

## CLI Usage

### Fetch a URL (dump rendered HTML)

```bash
./lightpanda fetch --obey_robots --log_format pretty --log_level info https://example.com
```

### Start CDP Server

```bash
./lightpanda serve --obey_robots --log_format pretty --log_level info --host 127.0.0.1 --port 9222
```

This launches a WebSocket-based CDP server for programmatic control.

### CLI Flags

| Flag | Description |
|------|-------------|
| `--obey_robots` | Respect robots.txt rules |
| `--log_format pretty` | Human-readable log output |
| `--log_level info` | Log verbosity: `debug`, `info`, `warn`, `error` |
| `--host 127.0.0.1` | Bind address for CDP server |
| `--port 9222` | Port for CDP server |
| `--insecure_disable_tls_host_verification` | Disable TLS verification (testing only) |

## Playwright Integration

Start the CDP server, then connect Playwright to it:

```javascript
import { chromium } from 'playwright-core';

const browser = await chromium.connectOverCDP('http://127.0.0.1:9222');
const context = await browser.contexts()[0] || await browser.newContext();
const page = await context.newPage();

await page.goto('https://example.com', { waitUntil: 'networkidle' });
const title = await page.title();
const content = await page.content();

console.log(`Title: ${title}`);
console.log(`HTML length: ${content.length}`);

await browser.close();
```

## Puppeteer Integration

```javascript
import puppeteer from 'puppeteer-core';

const browser = await puppeteer.connect({
  browserWSEndpoint: 'ws://127.0.0.1:9222',
});

const context = await browser.createBrowserContext();
const page = await context.newPage();

await page.goto('https://example.com', { waitUntil: 'networkidle0' });

const title = await page.title();
const text = await page.evaluate(() => document.body.innerText);

console.log(`Title: ${title}`);
console.log(`Body text: ${text.substring(0, 200)}`);

await page.close();
await browser.close();
```

## Go (chromedp) Integration

```go
package main

import (
    "context"
    "fmt"
    "log"

    "github.com/chromedp/chromedp"
)

func main() {
    allocCtx, cancel := chromedp.NewRemoteAllocator(context.Background(), "ws://127.0.0.1:9222")
    defer cancel()

    ctx, cancel := chromedp.NewContext(allocCtx)
    defer cancel()

    var title string
    err := chromedp.Run(ctx,
        chromedp.Navigate("https://example.com"),
        chromedp.Title(&title),
    )
    if err != nil {
        log.Fat