head to head · open source
CloakBrowser vs rod
CloakBrowser has 32,712 GitHub stars, 2,720 forks, 164 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. rod has 7,142 stars, 489 forks, 212 open issues and last shipped 3 months ago. CloakBrowser leads on adoption by 358% (32,712 vs 7,142 stars). CloakBrowser is written in Python under MIT; rod is written in Go under MIT. CloakBrowser has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, rod 7%. CloakBrowser was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
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 | rod | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 33K | ★ 7.1K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | Python | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2026-08-11 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.7K | ⑂ 489 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick CloakBrowser if
- You weight community size — 33K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick rod if
- You want the rod feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and rod fits your workflow better
About CloakBrowser
Stealth Chromium that passes every bot detection test. Not a patched config. Not a JS injection. A real Chromium binary with fingerprints modified at the C++ source level. Antibot systems score it as a normal browser — because it is a normal browser. Cloudflare Turnstile — 3 live tests passing (headed mode, macOS) Drop in Playwright/Puppeteer replacement for Python and JavaScript. Same API, same code — just swap the import. 3 lines of code, 30 seconds to unblock. 87 source level C++ patches — canvas, WebGL, audio, fonts, GPU, screen, WebRTC, network timing, automation signals, CDP input behavior humanize=True —…
read the full CloakBrowser overview →
About rod
Overview [ ][discord room] Documentation API reference FAQ Rod is a high level driver directly based on DevTools Protocol. It's designed for web automation and scraping for both high level and low level use, senior developers can use the low level packages and functions to easily customize or build up their own version of Rod, the high level functions are just examples to build a default version of Rod. 中文 API 文档 Features Chained context design, intuitive to timeout or cancel the long running task Auto wait elements to be ready Debugging friendly, auto input tracing, remote monitoring headless browser Thread…
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Frequently asked questions
Is CloakBrowser or rod more popular?
CloakBrowser has 32,712 GitHub stars and rod has 7,142. CloakBrowser has the larger community by that measure.
Are CloakBrowser and rod free?
Both are open source. CloakBrowser is licensed under MIT and rod under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between CloakBrowser and rod?
CloakBrowser is written in Python and rod in Go. 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 rod?
Choose CloakBrowser if you want the larger community (32,712 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose rod if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.