Lightpanda vs Selenium

Lightpanda

Version 1.0.2 runs locally with no account, and its 32-tool MCP server has typed schemas, an annotation on every tool and guidance to treat pages as untrusted. Telemetry is on by default, the CDP and HTTP MCP servers have no authentication, the cloud documents its token in the URL, and no status page or cloud terms were found.

Selenium

Selenium is stable, Apache-2.0 software on 4.51.0 with bindings in five languages, CI passing on trunk, an llms.txt and an agent guide added in September 2026. It has no MCP server of its own, Selenium Manager sends usage statistics by default, and Grid accepts unauthenticated sessions unless a username and password are set.

Lightpanda

1. Set LIGHTPANDA_DISABLE_TELEMETRY=true in the server's environment if usage data, the IP address and an instance ID shouldn't leave the machine.
2. Treat text from markdown, html, tree and links as untrusted page content, never as instructions.
3. Pass credentials as $LP_* placeholders in tool arguments and call getEnv without a name; naming a variable returns its value.
4. Check httpStatus in structuredContent after goto, since a 404 page or a load timeout is still reported as a successful navigation.
5. Keep lightpanda serve and lightpanda mcp --port on 127.0.0.1 or a Unix socket; neither checks who connects.

Selenium

1. Install with pip install selenium (Python 3.10 or later) and let Selenium Manager fetch drivers. Do not set driver paths
2. Use WebDriverWait with expected conditions, never fixed sleeps, and do not mix implicit and explicit waits
3. Set SE_AVOID_STATS=true to stop Selenium Manager sending usage statistics
4. Point coding agents at https://www.selenium.dev/llms.txt. Most Selenium 2 and 3 era examples use removed APIs
5. Set --username and --password before exposing a Grid beyond localhost. Check http://localhost:4444/status before creating sessions