---
slug: "steel-browser"
name: "Steel Browser"
effect: "Runs a self-hostable browser API that manages Chrome sessions agents connect to with Puppeteer or Playwright"
category: "browser-agent"
url: "https://steel.dev"
github: "steel-dev/steel-browser"
pricing: "open-source"
license: "Apache-2.0"
tags: ["browser-api", "self-hosted", "docker", "cdp", "puppeteer"]
platforms: ["docker"]
install_kind: "cli"
date_added: "2026-10-14"
drop_score: 31
stars: 7805
pushed_at: "2026-10-13T15:37:05Z"
signals_status: "ok"
signals_fetched_at: "2026-10-15T01:19:05.284Z"
page: "https://agenttooldrop.com/tools/steel-browser"
---

# Steel Browser

Runs a self-hostable browser API that manages Chrome sessions agents connect to with Puppeteer or Playwright

Category: Browser and computer use. Pricing: Open source. License: Apache-2.0.

Platforms: docker.

## Why you would want it

Steel is an open-source browser API server: it manages sessions, pages and Chrome processes so your agent code connects to a ready browser with Puppeteer, Playwright or Selenium. Sessions keep cookies and local storage across requests, and the server includes proxy chain management, custom Chrome extensions, stealth plugins and fingerprint management, and a UI for viewing and debugging sessions. Quick action endpoints return a page's HTML, a screenshot or a PDF in one REST call, and the Node and Python SDKs work against both self-hosted Steel and Steel Cloud.

## Best for

- Hosting your own browser infrastructure for agents
- Stateful sessions with proxies and extensions
- Teams already using Puppeteer, Playwright or Selenium

## Use it when

Your agent needs remote, stateful browser sessions and you want to run them yourself in Docker or use the managed Steel Cloud.

## Skip it if

You want something that decides what to do on a page: Steel provides the browser infrastructure, not the agent. The README describes the project as in public beta.

## Install

Run with Docker:

```sh
docker run -p 3000:3000 -p 9223:9223 ghcr.io/steel-dev/steel-browser
```

Source: https://github.com/steel-dev/steel-browser#readme

## Live signals

Fetched 2026-10-15T01:19:05.284Z (status: ok).

- Repository: steel-dev/steel-browser
- Stars: 7,805
- Forks: 996
- Open issues and PRs: 74
- License (GitHub): Apache-2.0
- Last push: 2026-10-13
- Latest release: v0.5.4-beta (2026-08-25)

## Links

- Website: https://steel.dev
- GitHub: https://github.com/steel-dev/steel-browser
- Install instructions verified at: https://github.com/steel-dev/steel-browser#readme
- Source for this entry: https://github.com/steel-dev/steel-browser#readme
- AgentToolDrop page: https://agenttooldrop.com/tools/steel-browser
- Full catalog (JSON): https://agenttooldrop.com/tools.json