Plasmate

The browser engine for agents.
HTML in. Semantic Object Model out.

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Plasmate compiles HTML into a Semantic Object Model (SOM), a structured representation that LLMs can reason about directly. It runs JavaScript via V8, supports Puppeteer via CDP, and produces output that is 10-800x smaller than raw HTML.

	Plasmate	Lightpanda	Chrome
Per page	4-5 ms	23 ms	252 ms
Memory (100 pages)	~30 MB	~2.4 GB	~20 GB
Binary	43 MB	59-111 MB	300-500 MB
Output	SOM (10-800x smaller)	Raw HTML	Raw HTML
License	Apache-2.0	AGPL-3.0	Chromium

Install

curl -fsSL https://plasmate.app/install.sh | sh

Or via package managers:

cargo install plasmate       # Rust
npm install -g plasmate      # Node.js
pip install plasmate         # Python

Quick Start

Fetch a page and get structured output

plasmate fetch https://news.ycombinator.com

Returns SOM JSON: structured regions, interactive elements with stable IDs, and content, typically 10x smaller than the raw HTML.

Start a CDP server (Puppeteer compatible)

plasmate serve --protocol cdp --host 127.0.0.1 --port 9222

Then connect with Puppeteer:

import puppeteer from 'puppeteer-core';

const browser = await puppeteer.connect({
  browserWSEndpoint: 'ws://127.0.0.1:9222',
  protocolTimeout: 10000,
});

const page = await browser.newPage();
await page.goto('https://example.com');

const title = await page.evaluate(() => document.title);
console.log(title);

await browser.close();

Start an AWP server (native protocol)

plasmate serve --protocol awp --host 127.0.0.1 --port 9222

AWP has 7 methods: navigate, snapshot, click, type, scroll, select, extract. That's the entire protocol.

Run as an MCP tool server (Model Context Protocol)

plasmate mcp

This exposes Plasmate over stdio as MCP tools:

• fetch_page - get structured SOM from any URL
• extract_text - get clean readable text
• open_page - start an interactive session (returns session_id + SOM)
• evaluate - run JavaScript in the page context
• click - click elements by SOM element ID
• close_page - end a session

Example Claude Desktop config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "plasmate": {
      "command": "plasmate",
      "args": ["mcp"]
    }
  }
}

What is SOM?

The DOM was built for rendering. SOM was built for reasoning.

Wikipedia homepage:
  DOM  → 47,000 tokens
  SOM  → 4,500 tokens (10.4x compression)

accounts.google.com:
  DOM  → ~300,000 tokens
  SOM  → ~350 tokens (864x compression)

SOM strips layout, styling, scripts, SVGs, and boilerplate. It keeps structure, content, and interactive elements with stable IDs that agents can reference in actions.

Token Compression (38-site benchmark)

Site	HTML	SOM	Compression
accounts.google.com	1.2 MB	1.4 KB	864x
x.com	239 KB	1.5 KB	159x
linear.app	2.2 MB	21 KB	105x
bing.com	157 KB	1.7 KB	93x
google.com	194 KB	2.6 KB	74x
vercel.com	941 KB	22 KB	43x
ebay.com	831 KB	33 KB	25x
Wikipedia	1.7 MB	70 KB	25x

Median compression: 10.2x across 38 sites. Full results.

JavaScript Support

Plasmate embeds V8 and executes page JavaScript, including:

• Inline and external <script> tags
• fetch() and XMLHttpRequest with real HTTP requests
• setTimeout / setInterval with timer draining
• DOM mutations (createElement, appendChild, textContent, innerHTML, etc.)
• DOMContentLoaded and load events
• Promise resolution and microtask pumping

The JS pipeline runs during plasmate fetch and CDP page.goto(). The resulting DOM mutations are serialized back to HTML before SOM compilation, so JS-rendered content is captured.

CDP Compatibility

Plasmate passes Lightpanda's Puppeteer benchmark (campfire-commerce). Supported CDP methods:

• page.goto(), page.content(), page.title()
• page.evaluate(), page.waitForFunction()
• browser.newPage(), browser.createBrowserContext()
• Runtime.evaluate, Runtime.callFunctionOn
• DOM.getDocument, DOM.querySelector, DOM.querySelectorAll
• Input.dispatchMouseEvent, Input.dispatchKeyEvent
• Target management (create, attach, close)

CDP is a compatibility layer. AWP is the native protocol, designed for agents rather than debuggers.

Architecture

HTML → Network (reqwest) → HTML Parser (html5ever)
  → JS Pipeline (V8: scripts, fetch, XHR, timers, DOM mutations)
    → DOM Serialization → SOM Compiler → JSON output

• Network: reqwest with TLS, HTTP/2, redirects, compression; cookie jar supported, cookie APIs and proxy configuration are still limited
• JS Runtime: V8 with DOM shim (80+ methods), blocking fetch bridge
• SOM Compiler: semantic region detection, element ID generation, interactive element preservation, smart truncation, deduplication
• Protocols: AWP (native, 7 methods) and CDP (Puppeteer compatibility)

Build from Source

git clone https://github.com/plasmate-labs/plasmate.git
cd plasmate
cargo build --release
./target/release/plasmate fetch https://example.com

Requirements: Rust 1.75+, V8 (fetched automatically by rusty_v8).

Docker

Prebuilt multi-arch images (linux/amd64 and linux/arm64) are published to GHCR:

# Server mode (CDP or AWP)
docker run --rm -p 9222:9222 ghcr.io/plasmate-labs/plasmate:latest

# One-shot fetch
docker run --rm ghcr.io/plasmate-labs/plasmate:latest fetch https://example.com

Build locally:

docker build -t plasmate .
docker run --rm -p 9222:9222 plasmate

Tests

cargo test --workspace    # 252 tests

Benchmarks

Run the built-in benchmark against cached pages:

cargo run --release -- bench --urls bench/urls.txt

Or test against live sites:

plasmate fetch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rust_(programming_language) | jq '.regions | length'

See plasmate.app/compare for the full comparison with Lightpanda and Chrome.

Roadmap

• MCP server mode (plasmate mcp over stdio)
• MCP Phase 2: stateful tools (open_page, click, evaluate, close_page)
• Docker image (GHCR multi-arch)
• Full V8 DOM mutation bridge (re-snapshot SOM after JS changes)
• Network interception (Fetch domain)
• Expose cookie APIs (CDP Network.getCookies/setCookies, MCP cookie import/export)
• Proxy support (per-session config, SOCKS)
• Real-world top-100 site coverage testing
• Web Platform Tests integration

License

Apache-2.0. See LICENSE.

Built by Plasmate Labs.