Browser Use vs Browserless

Browser Use

The hosted cloud accepts x402 top-ups in USDC on Base with no account or API key, and publishes prices, rate limits and three OpenAPI documents. The privacy policy says inputs are used to train Browser Use's models, API keys have no documented scopes, and no prompt-injection guidance was found in the docs.

Browserless

An OpenAPI document, llms.txt and a 14-tool MCP server with annotations on every tool make the service easy for an agent to read, and the free plan needs no card. The API token travels in the URL query string by default, cloud tokens carry no scopes, and no machine payment route exists.

Browser Use

1. Send the key as X-Browser-Use-API-Key with no Bearer prefix. A Bearer header returns 401
2. Stop browsers with PATCH /api/v4/browsers/{id} and {"action":"stop"}. Closing CDP or the SDK client leaves the browser billing
3. Poll GET /runs/{id}/status, not the full run, and wait for the returned Retry-After on 429, which can be 300 seconds at the edge
4. Before resubmitting after a timeout, read the existing run's status. The server keeps running and may already have submitted a form
5. With a wallet and no key, call x402.api.browser-use.com on /api/v2 or /api/v3 routes. A task stops with INSUFFICIENT_CREDITS if credit runs out mid-run

Browserless

1. Send the token as Authorization: Bearer to the MCP server. On REST and WebSocket routes it goes in ?token=, so keep those URLs out of logs
2. Close sessions as soon as the work is done. Browser time bills one unit per 30 seconds, rounded up, idle or not
3. For multi-step work with browserless_agent, set keepSessionAlive: true on the first call and pass the returned sessionId after that. Sessions are one-shot by default since server 1.33.0
4. On 429, back off and retry. It means the plan's concurrency limit or queue is full, usually from sessions left open
5. Match the path to the protocol. Use /chromium for CDP clients and /chromium/playwright only for playwright.connect()