Browser MCP Pattern (Playwright + Browserless)

A fully headless browser MCP server that provides web navigation, screenshots, JavaScript execution, element extraction, and click interactions. Uses browserless/chrome as the rendering engine and Playwright for the MCP integration.

Architecture

Open WebUI / Hermes
  │ MCP (Streamable HTTP)
  ↓
mcp-browser (Python 3.13, FastMCP, Playwright)
  │ CDP WebSocket
  ↓
browserless/chrome (headless Chromium)

Docker Compose (add to existing LiteLLM stack)

services:
  browserless:
    image: browserless/chrome:latest
    container_name: browserless
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      - CONNECTION_TIMEOUT=600000
      - MAX_CONCURRENT_SESSIONS=5
      - PREBOOT_CHROME=true
    ports:
      - '127.0.0.1:3005:3000'   # 3000 conflicts with Open WebUI host mapping
    networks:
      - litellm-net
    deploy:
      resources:
        limits: {cpus: '2', memory: '1G'}
        reservations: {cpus: '0.5', memory: '256M'}

  mcp-browser:
    build: ../mcp-browser
    container_name: mcp-browser
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      - BROWSER_WS=ws://browserless:3000   # Docker internal network name
      - PYTHONUNBUFFERED=1
    ports:
      - '127.0.0.1:8901:8901'
    networks:
      - litellm-net
    depends_on:
      - browserless

Dockerfile

FROM python:3.13-slim
WORKDIR /app
RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends \
    curl ca-certificates && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*
COPY requirements.txt .
RUN pip install --no-cache-dir -r requirements.txt
RUN python3 -m playwright install chromium
RUN python3 -m playwright install-deps chromium
COPY server.py ./
ENV PYTHONUNBUFFERED=1
EXPOSE 8901
CMD ["python3", "server.py"]

Requirements

fastmcp>=3.0.0
playwright>=1.45.0
httpx>=0.27.0

Server Template (server.py)

from fastmcp import FastMCP
from playwright.async_api import async_playwright
import base64, os

BROWSER_WS = os.getenv('BROWSER_WS', 'ws://browserless:3000')
mcp = FastMCP('Browser', version='1.0.0')
_browser = None

async def get_browser():
    global _browser
    if _browser is None:
        pw = await async_playwright().start()
        _browser = await pw.chromium.connect_over_cdp(BROWSER_WS)
    return _browser

@mcp.tool(description="Navigate to a URL and return page text + title")
async def browse(url: str) -> str:
    browser = await get_browser()
    page = await browser.new_page()
    try:
        await page.goto(url, wait_until='networkidle', timeout=30000)
        title = await page.title()
        text = await page.evaluate('document.body?.innerText || ""')
        return f"Title: {title}\n\n{text[:10000]}"
    finally:
        await page.close()

@mcp.tool(description="Take a full-page screenshot, return as base64 PNG")
async def screenshot(url: str) -> str:
    browser = await get_browser()
    page = await browser.new_page()
    try:
        await page.goto(url, wait_until='networkidle', timeout=30000)
        data = await page.screenshot(full_page=True, type='png')
        return f"data:image/png;base64,{base64.b64encode(data).decode()}"
    finally:
        await page.close()

@mcp.tool(description="Execute JavaScript on a page, return result")
async def execute_js(url: str, code: str) -> str:
    browser = await get_browser()
    page = await browser.new_page()
    try:
        await page.goto(url, wait_until='networkidle', timeout=30000)
        result = await page.evaluate(code)
        return str(result)[:5000]
    finally:
        await page.close()

@mcp.tool(description="Extract content by CSS selector")
async def extract_element(url: str, selector: str) -> str:
    browser = await get_browser()
    page = await browser.new_page()
    try:
        await page.goto(url, wait_until='networkidle', timeout=30000)
        elements = await page.query_selector_all(selector)
        texts = [await el.inner_text() for el in elements if (await el.inner_text()).strip()]
        return f"Found {len(texts)} elements matching '{selector}':\n" + "\n---\n".join(texts[:10])
    finally:
        await page.close()

@mcp.tool(description="Click an element by text or CSS selector, return new page state")
async def click(url: str, target: str, is_selector: bool = False) -> str:
    browser = await get_browser()
    page = await browser.new_page()
    try:
        await page.goto(url, wait_until='networkidle', timeout=30000)
        if is_selector:
            await page.click(target)
        else:
            await page.click(f'text={target}')
        await page.wait_for_load_state('networkidle', timeout=10000)
        title = await page.title()
        text = await page.evaluate('document.body?.innerText || ""')
        return f"Title: {title}\nURL: {page.url}\n\n{text[:8000]}"
    finally:
        await page.close()

if __name__ == '__main__':
    mcp.run(transport='http', host='0.0.0.0', port=8901, path='/mcp')

Verifying

docker exec mcp-browser python3 -c "
from fastmcp import Client, asyncio
async def test():
    async with Client('http://127.0.0.1:8901/mcp') as client:
        tools = await client.list_tools()
        print(f'Tools: {len(tools)}')
        for t in tools:
            print(f'  - {t.name}: {t.description[:50]}...')
asyncio.run(test())
"

Pitfalls

Port 3000 conflict — Open WebUI maps host port 3000. Browserless also defaults to 3000. Use 127.0.0.1:3005:3000 to remap.
Playwright deps install is slow — playwright install-deps chromium pulls apt packages, 2-3 min build time. Cache the Docker layer.
Browserless TOKEN env — Set TOKEN= (empty) to disable token auth. The default requires no auth for internal networks.
Slim images lack curl — The Dockerfile adds curl ca-certificates explicitly. Health checks using curl still won't work in slim containers without this.
CDP connection reuse — The server reuses one browser instance across all requests via connect_over_cdp. Each tool opens/closes a page (tab), not a whole browser.

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