Turn the browser into part of your product.
BrowserPane is an open-source remote browser stack for ephemeral Linux containers. Hybrid rendering keeps interfaces crisp, video stays smooth where it matters, and browser sessions become embeddable, controllable, and shareable. Built for human-in-the-loop AI, guided workflows, co-browsing, support, and demos. The core works. Now it’s time to harden it in the open.
Use Cases: AI Agents, Co-Browsing & Secure Automation
Built for scenarios where a browser needs to be more than a tab.
AI Agents & Workflows
Embed a fully functional browser into AI agent workflows. BrowserPane exposes CDP and Playwright endpoints natively — your agent controls the browser, the user sees what’s happening and can step in anytime.
Co-Browsing & Collaboration
Turn the browser into a shared workspace. Multiple participants in one containerized session — for co-browsing, live demos, onboarding, or real-time support. No plugins, no installs.
Secure Automation
Run risky tasks in a disposable environment. Each session gets a fresh Linux container with full isolation — nothing touches your local infrastructure. The container is destroyed when the session ends.
How BrowserPane Works
The technical foundation of BrowserPane — open, modular, evolving.
01 Hybrid Rendering
Tile-based rendering keeps UI and text crisp while using minimal bandwidth. For media-heavy regions, the system switches to video streaming automatically. No DOM serialization, no full-frame encoding waste.
02 Bandwidth Efficiency
Compared to VDI solutions that stream entire desktops, BrowserPane only transmits what actually changes. Ephemeral containers instead of persistent VMs — less overhead, lower latency, leaner infrastructure. We’re working toward significantly higher session density per node. Resource efficiency is a core design goal. Read our technical comparison of RBI vs VDI →
03 System Integration
Direct integration via Chrome DevTools Protocol (CDP) and Playwright-compatible WebSocket endpoints. Native support for:
- ✓ Shared Sessions
- ✓ Audio, Mic and Camera
- ✓ Clipboard & File transfer
04 Exact Customization
The headless Chromium renders at the exact pixel dimensions of its container. No black bars, no scaling artifacts — it adapts to your UI, not the other way around. Stealth plugins included for reliable automation.
05 Execution
We’re building toward a graduated execution model — from lightweight headless automation to full visual AI control to live human takeover — within the same isolated session. No session handoff, no context loss.
06 Custom Streaming Layer
The visual streaming layer is a custom implementation built on modern web standards — optimized for crisp text, low latency, and minimal overhead.
UI or prefer a little CLI instead?
Frequently Asked Questions
What BrowserPane is, where it stands, and how to get involved.
What is BrowserPane?
BrowserPane is an open-source remote browser that runs inside ephemeral Linux containers. It embeds into your product as a live, interactive pane — users can browse, supervise, or share sessions in real time. The browser becomes a controllable product surface instead of just another tab.
How does hybrid rendering work?
The viewport is split into regions. Static areas — text, forms, UI chrome — are transmitted as tiles, only when they change. Media-heavy regions switch to video streaming automatically. The result is crisp text, smooth video, and significantly lower bandwidth than full-frame encoding.
What's the current project status?
BrowserPane is functional and growing. The core — container orchestration, hybrid rendering, WebRTC streaming — is in place. Developer experience, documentation, and edge cases are taking shape. Expect steady progress, not perfection.
How can I contribute?
Visit the GitHub repository. Open issues, submit pull requests, improve the documentation, or share your use case. Feedback on the rendering pipeline and Playwright integration is especially valuable.
How does BrowserPane differ from traditional VDI?
Traditional VDI streams entire desktops from persistent VMs. BrowserPane streams only a browser viewport from ephemeral containers — lighter, faster, and designed to be embedded in products rather than replace a desktop. Our long-term vision goes further: hardware-level session isolation through dedicated micro-VMs with their own guest kernels. Read our deep-dive on RBI vs VDI →
Is BrowserPane secure?
Every session runs in a strictly isolated Linux container with Remote Browser Isolation (RBI). No code reaches your local system. Data Loss Prevention protocols are enforced, and containers are destroyed after each session.
What integrations are supported?
Chrome DevTools Protocol (CDP) and Playwright-compatible WebSocket endpoints. Connect your existing Playwright scripts to a remote session with a single endpoint URL — no local browser installation needed. Plus native support for shared sessions, audio, mic, camera, clipboard, and file transfer.
What license does BrowserPane use?
Source code is AGPL-3.0. The project is fully open source — inspect, modify, self-host. Content and documentation are CC BY 4.0.
How does BrowserPane compare to Browserbase or Kasm?
Browserbase focuses on headless browser API hosting for automation. Kasm provides full-desktop VDI streaming in containers. BrowserPane takes a different approach: embeddable, visual browser sessions with hybrid rendering and human-in-the-loop control — designed to be part of your product, not a standalone tool.
How do I embed a browser in my application?
BrowserPane provides an embeddable browser component that runs in ephemeral containers. Integration happens via WebSocket — connect your frontend to a BrowserPane session and render the live browser view in your product UI.
What is the difference between a headless browser and a remote browser?
A headless browser runs locally without a GUI — useful for scripts but resource-intensive at scale. A remote browser runs on a server and streams the visual output to the client. BrowserPane combines both: headless execution for automation, visual streaming for human interaction.
Can BrowserPane be used for web scraping?
BrowserPane runs browsers in isolated containers with stealth plugins, making it suitable for automation workflows that require session isolation. Each run gets a fresh container and clean browser profile.
Contribute
BrowserPane is AGPL-3.0 licensed and developed in public. Explore the code, open an issue, or get in touch — this project grows through collaboration.