Our take
Inactiveno commits in over a year- Activity
- 20
- Community
- 32
- Issues
- 21
- Pull requests
- 21
-1 stars in the last 7 days
Carbonyl is an unusual, capable terminal browser, but its inactive status and highly concentrated contributions make it a risky choice for a maintained production dependency.
Good fit if
- You specifically need Chromium-based browsing inside a terminal, including modern web content.
- You can use the available Docker, npm, or binary distribution and do not need ongoing upstream changes.
- You are comfortable with BSD-3-Clause licensing and its attribution and license-notice conditions.
Look elsewhere if
- You need an actively maintained browser project, since Carbonyl has had no recent commits or releases.
- Your adoption depends on regular issue handling: no issues were closed in the measured recent period, and most contributions come from one person.
- You need fullscreen mode or browser extensions, which the project identifies as unsupported or not yet available.
All health signals
| Last commit | 2024-07-01 (2.3 years ago) |
|---|---|
| Commits, last 90 days | 0 |
| Releases, last 12 months | 0 (latest v0.0.3, 2023-02-18) |
| Contributors | 11 (top contributor: 88% of commits) |
| Issues closed, last 90 days | 0 |
| Project age | 3 years |
Checked on 2026-10-07 with the GitHub API.
Overview
Carbonyl is a Chromium-based browser that renders web pages directly in a terminal. It addresses a limitation of text-oriented terminal browsers: pages can use modern web APIs and JavaScript, and the browser can display or play media, without requiring a graphical window server.
It is aimed at people who want a graphical-browser-like web experience over SSH, in a console, or in other environments without a desktop. The project is inactive: it has had no commits in over a year and no release in over a year.
Key Features
- Runs Chromium in a terminal and can work without a window server.
- Supports modern web APIs, including WebGL, WebGPU, audio, and video, according to the project.
- Runs JavaScript and WebAssembly through its Chromium base.
- Offers Docker, npm, and prebuilt binary installation paths.
- Supports Linux, macOS, Windows 11, and WSL, based on the operating systems tested by the project.
- Splits its implementation between a Rust core library and a modified Chromium headless-shell runtime.
Use Cases
- SSH users who need to open modern websites from a remote terminal without forwarding a desktop session.
- Developers who want to inspect a web page from a console or a system without a window server.
- Terminal enthusiasts who need JavaScript or media support beyond what text browsers such as Lynx provide.
- Teams experimenting with browser rendering in terminal-based workflows, provided they can accept an inactive project.
What you need
Detected in the repository
- Node.js (from package.json)
- Rust (from Cargo.toml)
- A Dockerfile, so it can run in a container
License in plain words
BSD-3-Clausepermissive
- Commercial use: yes
- Modify and redistribute: yes
- You must keep: the copyright and license notice; the authors' names cannot endorse your product
- Share your changes: no
A summary, not legal advice: the LICENSE file is what applies.
Getting Started
Run Carbonyl in Docker with a URL:
docker run --rm -ti fathyb/carbonyl https://youtube.com
For npm, binaries, and build instructions, see the README.
Considerations
The project is marked inactive, with no commits or releases in over a year. Although the contributor count is more than one, most of the code comes from one person, and the measured recent issue-closure count is zero. Plan for limited maintenance and verify that the available build or distribution works for your environment.
The README notes that Linux use outside Docker requires Chromium's dependencies. Building the Rust core is relatively straightforward, but building the Chromium runtime is a substantial undertaking with significant time and disk requirements. Fullscreen mode is not supported, and browser extensions are not currently supported. The BSD-3-Clause license permits broad reuse subject to its license and notice requirements.
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