head to head · open source
CloakBrowser vs auto-browser
CloakBrowser has 31,936 GitHub stars, 2,652 forks, 238 open issues and last shipped yesterday. auto-browser has 900 stars, 152 forks, 1 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. CloakBrowser leads on adoption by 3,448% (31,936 vs 900 stars). CloakBrowser is written in Python under MIT; auto-browser is written in Python under MIT. CloakBrowser has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, auto-browser 17%. CloakBrowser was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (ai-agents, browser-automation, playwright), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| CloakBrowser | auto-browser | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 32K | ★ 900 |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-10-06 | 2026-10-05 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.7K | ⑂ 152 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick CloakBrowser if
- You weight community size — 32K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick auto-browser if
- You want the auto-browser feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and auto-browser fits your workflow better
About CloakBrowser
CloakBrowser is a stealth Chromium build for Python and JavaScript teams that need browser automation to survive bot detection systems, aimed at scraping and AI agent engineers who want to replace Playwright or Puppeteer without rewriting their code.
read the full CloakBrowser overview →
About auto-browser
Auto Browser is an open source, MCP native browser control plane that gives AI agents and MCP clients a real Playwright driven browser with human takeover, approvals, and local first deployment.
read the full auto-browser overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is CloakBrowser or auto-browser more popular?
CloakBrowser has 31,936 GitHub stars and auto-browser has 900. CloakBrowser has the larger community by that measure.
Are CloakBrowser and auto-browser free?
Both are open source. CloakBrowser is licensed under MIT and auto-browser under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between CloakBrowser and auto-browser?
CloakBrowser is written in Python and auto-browser in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, CloakBrowser or auto-browser?
Choose CloakBrowser if you want the larger community (31,936 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose auto-browser if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.