Here’s the guide:
Over the past year, browsers stopped being quiet observers and started talking back.
AI browsers aren’t just a UX refresh, they’re a fundamental shift in how we interact with the internet. Think of it like turning the browser from a window into a co-pilot. You’re not just clicking around anymore. You’re commanding, prompting, delegating.
And suddenly, everyone wants to build the cockpit.
In this post, I map out the emerging AI browser market and explore why your next “search” might just be a conversation.
Consumer Browsers
The consumer browser wars are heating up. Only this time, it’s not about tab management or speed; it’s about who your assistant is. To me, it seems like a no-brainer that things are trending in this direction. I mean, it was only a matter of time before the hassle of opening a new tab and navigating to the ChatGPT website got annoying. But do these new players stand a chance against the browser giants?
Chrome seems to be taking a combative approach, integrating Gemini into the platform itself. This allows it to take on similar roles to many current consumer AI browsers, though rollout is still in progress. Apple’s Safari, on the other hand, may be leaving more room in the browser space. While they’re releasing “Apple Intelligence,” which will integrate with existing Apple products and Safari to perform many AI functions, it’s not part of a specific web app and is inherently OS-based. This still leaves space for third-party browsers to pick up where Safari and Chrome leave off.
That said, I’d be remiss not to mention the rumblings of OpenAI’s AI browser, apparently codenamed “Aura.” With ChatGPT integration and similar features to other AI browsers—like tab-based conversation and agent-like abilities—this could be the biggest development in consumer browsing yet. If, as some claim, OpenAI ships this to users this summer, it may trigger the largest user migration away from traditional browsing platforms.
So, as the browser giants play catch-up, the AI browsers taking more unique approaches may be able to capture a significant chunk of the market. Soon, it won’t be enough for a browser to just open into a chat or interact with your webpages, it’ll need to actually carry out functions for you. Think: an integrated agent as part of your search workflow, managing emails in one tab while organizing a spreadsheet in another.
Fellou is like if Google had a soul and actually knew what you meant. Minimal, ambient, and a little eerie—in a good way.
Dia is building an agent-first browser that learns and evolves with you. Less “search bar,” more “send agent.”
Comet by Perplexity might just be the most usable AI search experience out there. Imagine a browser that not only finds the answer but explains it, organizes it, and books it if needed.
Opera Neon is the legacy player’s experimental playground. Flashy, visual, and starting to lean AI-native.
OpenAI (Aura) is the big unknown. If OpenAI really builds an AI-native browser, the browser giants might finally meet their match. Early leaks suggest deep integration with ChatGPT, voice input, and memory.
Arc Max is quietly becoming the cool kid’s browser, with AI layered into everyday interactions. Summarize this, rename that, organize it for me.
Brave Leo makes privacy-conscious AI the default. Think ChatGPT, but local, fast, and with guaranteed privacy.
Nimo Infinity and Genspark AI are early-stage but ambitious, offering agents that collaborate across apps, plan projects, and synthesize info like a team of interns that don’t sleep.
We’re moving toward the browser as a brain. One that remembers what you care about, understands your workflow, and maybe even acts before you ask. My personal favorite right now? I’ve been a big fan of Dia lately, it has a great interface and helpful writing capabilities, especially when responding to emails or helping with background research.
Enterprise Browsers
In the enterprise world, AI in the browser is less about style and more about safety, scale, and security. These tools don’t just assist—they enforce policies, automate workflows, and watch your digital back.
The challenge with secure enterprise browsers (SEBs) is that they require constant vigilance. To keep a browser fully secure, its team must continuously fix bugs and patch vulnerabilities. That makes putting your private data in the hands of an external browser developer a hard sell for many enterprises. This highlights the main problem with newer enterprise browsers: even companies like Arc, which managed a functioning enterprise browser for a time, eventually shifted focus due to upkeep costs. Many others may face the same fate.
That’s why, in the enterprise browser space, built-in systems from big players may ultimately win out. But the race is by no means over; there are still contenders that, if they execute well, could lead the pack.
Strawberry Browser AI is making low-code AI workflows accessible to non-technical teams, imagine auto-filling CRM records, or generating instant client reports from internal data.
Wave is like having a junior analyst living in your browser, automating routine business tasks and sourcing insights.
Ulaa (from Zoho) blends privacy-first principles with team productivity. No trackers. No compromises.
Island is what happens when your CISO designs a browser. Full control over permissions, data loss prevention, and AI policy integrations.
Microsoft Edge Copilot, let’s be honest, might quietly win this race by default. It’s already embedded across Microsoft 365 and comes pre-bundled in your work life whether you like it or not.
I think enterprise AI browsers will become control towers: role-based permissions, LLMs with audit trails, AI agents that summarize Zoom calls and populate Salesforce; all without switching tabs. As someone who doesn’t currently use an enterprise browser day-to-day, my take may mean less, but from what I’ve tested, Island seems like the best bet for teams prioritizing privacy and workflow efficiency.
Developer Frameworks
None of this happens without the frameworks building the scaffolding. These aren’t just SDKs or wrappers; they’re the wiring beneath the new interface of the internet. They define how agents see, think, and move. Without them, “AI in a browser” is just a concept.
But here’s the kicker: these frameworks don’t just enable AI agents, they shape how we think about them. They dictate what’s legible to an agent (DOM trees, events, session state), how it makes decisions (step-by-step planning, memory, feedback loops), and how it interacts (clicks, inputs, file downloads, dynamic UI adaptation). They are the perception-action loop, the senses and muscles bundled into one programmable interface.
If browsers are evolving into operating systems for the internet, then these frameworks are the system calls. And like any foundational layer, the design choices these tools make are ideological as much as technical. Do you want an agent to be surgical and deterministic—or creative and improvisational? Should it act like a microservice or a teammate? These aren’t philosophical questions; they’re defaults baked into the frameworks themselves.
Just like TensorFlow once shaped the way we approached neural networks, or React reframed how we built web UIs, frameworks like browserbase, LangChain, hyperbrowser, and browser-use are steering the early mental models of what agents are. Not just what they can do, but how we imagine working with them. In that sense, they’re less like libraries and more like blueprints for a new kind of software development. If agents really are the next interface layer of the web, then these frameworks are already laying the foundation for how that world will feel.
Browser-use is an open-source playground for building real-time web agents—watch them scroll, click, reason, and act.
Browserbase offers a headless, cloud-native browser built for scale—perfect for agentic workflows. Bonus: it pairs nicely with Stagehand, a visual debugger for web agents.
Hyperbrowser is all about custom, controllable agents. You define the browser behavior, from observation to action.
LangChain the OG agent framework, now supports browser tooling. If you’re building agents, this is still the default backend.
CrewAI lets you coordinate multiple agents in the same environment. Like launching a tiny startup inside your browser.
Manus It’s part agent framework, part vision statement for what programmable interfaces could look like.
The rise of dev frameworks signals a future where anyone, not just big companies, can launch agents that live in and control the browser. Tooling, observability, and compliance will define the winners.
My current favorite? Browser-use. It lets you build agents, watch them work, and step in if needed. But I think these frameworks will soon fade into the background for most users. Right now, AI browsers are mostly siloed, each building its own logic, memory, workflow, and UI. But frameworks? They’re the connective tissue.
Eventually, AI browsers will stop hardcoding everything and start relying on frameworks like LangChain, Browserbase, and Hyperbrowser to handle cognition and orchestration. This will likely evolve in two directions:
Embedded frameworks: dev tools within the browser itself (e.g. Arc Max using mini LangChain-style agents)
Externally operated browsers: where the browser is invisible, a container for agent execution (e.g. browser-use or browserbase spinning up headless sessions and managing behavior through code)
As these models mature, the line between browser and agent framework will blur. Some browsers may even pivot entirely into platforms for frameworks.
Reflections & Concerns
The excitement around AI browsers is real. But so are the risks.
Data Privacy: AI agents operating in the browser often interact with emails, banking, internal systems. Who owns this data? Who stores it? Privacy-first browsers like Ulaa, Brave Leo, and Island are taking this seriously, but consumer awareness is still catching up.
Over-Automation: Giving agents too much control over actions like purchases, bookings, or form submissions could lead to unintended consequences. Guardrails are still evolving.
Fragmentation: We’re entering a period where Chrome-based browsers, AI-native browsers, and closed enterprise browsers will all compete. This could lead to fragmented standards unless protocols emerge for interoperability (e.g. “Agent-to-Agent” APIs).
My Take
AI browsers aren’t just the next app category. They’re the next operating system.
We’re watching the interface layer get rewritten in real time. As AI agents learn to operate within (and across) websites, the browser becomes a canvas for intelligence, not just content. The winners of this space won’t just display the internet; they’ll help us interact with it, automate it, and even understand it.
We're witnessing the dawn of the agentic web, and your browser may soon be your most powerful teammate.