Self-Hosted

Move a self-hosted Chrome fleet to Kernel

If you run your own Chrome — in Docker, on Kubernetes, or as a process on a box — migrating is less about API calls and more about deleting infrastructure.

What you stop operating

What you operate today	On Kernel
Container image with Chromium and its dependencies	Nothing. Browsers are created from Kernel’s image.
Autoscaler and warm-pool logic	Browser pools, or browsers.create() at ~30ms
Orphan and zombie process reaping	timeout_seconds on every browser
Per-container memory tuning	Fixed per-browser resources: 8 GB headful, 1 GB headless
A patched or stealth-plugin Chromium build	Anti-detection on every browser, stealth mode for the managed proxy and solver
Proxy contracts and rotation code	Proxies, unmetered, or bring your own
VNC or noVNC sidecar for debugging	Live view and replays
Your own metrics pipeline for browser events	Telemetry
A VPN or bastion so the browser can reach internal services	Private networking
Cookie jars and login scripts	Profiles and managed auth

The connection change

Whatever you point Playwright or Puppeteer at today becomes a Kernel cdp_ws_url:

Typescript/Javascript

import Kernel from '@onkernel/sdk';
import { chromium } from 'playwright';

const kernel = new Kernel();
const kernelBrowser = await kernel.browsers.create({ timeout_seconds: 600 });

const browser = await chromium.connectOverCDP(kernelBrowser.cdp_ws_url);
const page = browser.contexts()[0].pages()[0];
await page.goto('https://example.com');

await kernel.browsers.deleteByID(kernelBrowser.session_id);

Then make these three changes

That gets you running. The benefit is in what comes next, in this order:

1. Stop connecting over CDP for the hot path. Playwright execution runs your code inside the browser’s VM: no round trip per action, no connection to keep alive, and no CDP fingerprint for anti-bot vendors to read. See how you drive the browser.
2. Replace your session-state handling with profiles, and your login scripts with managed auth.
3. Delete your warm-pool code. Browser pools hold pre-configured browsers with a fill rate, and idle pool browsers aren’t billed.

Two things to check before cutting over

• Region. Browsers default to us-east. If your loop runs elsewhere, either move it or run it on the App Platform — otherwise you trade container start-up latency for network latency.
• Isolation model. Each Kernel browser is a microVM with its own kernel, so per-browser isolation is stronger than a shared-kernel container. If you were multiplexing tabs across one Chrome to save memory, use more browsers instead.

If you’re moving a large or unusual fleet, talk to us — its shape usually determines whether pools, on-demand browsers, or the App Platform is the right target.