Deploy and Host Steel Browser on Railway

Steel Browser is a browser automation platform built for AI agents, web scraping, screenshots, browser testing, and programmable browser sessions. It provides both an API and Web UI for controlling headless browser workloads, making it suitable for applications that require JavaScript rendering, cookies, sessions, and real browser interaction.

About Hosting Steel Browser

Hosting Steel Browser on Railway gives you a self-hosted browser automation service without manually managing Chromium, browser dependencies, or server infrastructure.

This template uses the official combined Steel Browser image, which includes both the API and Web UI in a single service. The service runs on port 3000, stores browser logs in persistent Railway storage, and can generate public session and debugger URLs using the Railway public domain.

Once deployed, Steel Browser can be accessed through its Web UI or integrated directly with backends, automation services, AI agents, Playwright-compatible workflows, and other browser automation clients.

Common Use Cases

Browser automation for AI agents and autonomous workflows
Web scraping and structured data extraction from dynamic websites
Screenshots, browser testing, and automated user interaction

Dependencies for Steel Browser Hosting

Official ghcr.io/steel-dev/steel-browser:latest Docker image
Persistent Railway volume mounted at /data/logs

Implementation Details

This template uses the following environment variables:

PORT="3000" # HTTP API port used by Steel Browser
RAILWAY_RUN_UID="0" # Run as root to ensure Railway volume write permissions
LOG_STORAGE_PATH="/data/logs/browser-logs.duckdb" # Persistent browser log database path
LOG_STORAGE_ENABLED="true" # Enable persistent browser log storage
HOST="0.0.0.0" # Bind Steel Browser to all network interfaces
DOMAIN="${{RAILWAY_PUBLIC_DOMAIN}}" # Public hostname used to generate API and session URLs
NODE_ENV="production" # Run Steel Browser in production mode
CDP_DOMAIN="${{RAILWAY_PUBLIC_DOMAIN}}" # Public hostname used for CDP and debugger URLs
CHROME_HEADLESS="true" # Run Chrome in headless mode
ENABLE_CDP_LOGGING="false" # Enable detailed Chrome DevTools Protocol logs
ENABLE_VERBOSE_LOGGING="false" # Enable verbose Steel Browser application logs

Persistent browser logs are stored at:

/data/logs

Expose the service through Railway public networking on:

Port 3000

After deployment:

Open the Steel Browser service in Railway.
Go to Settings → Networking.
Generate a public Railway domain for port 3000.
Open the Steel Browser Web UI at:

https://your-steel-browser.up.railway.app/ui

Create a browser session.
Test navigation, screenshots, scraping, or browser interaction.
Use the API endpoint from your backend, AI agent, or automation workflow.

The default architecture is:

Application / AI Agent
        │
        ▼
Steel Browser :3000
        │
        ├── API
        ├── Web UI
        ├── Browser Sessions
        └── CDP / Debugger

Steel Browser is especially useful when normal HTTP requests are not enough and your application requires JavaScript execution, authentication sessions, cookies, page rendering, navigation, clicks, or other browser-level interactions.

Why Deploy Steel Browser on Railway?

Railway is a singular platform to deploy your infrastructure stack. Railway will host your infrastructure so you don't have to deal with configuration, while allowing you to vertically and horizontally scale it.

By deploying Steel Browser on Railway, you are one step closer to supporting a complete full-stack application with minimal burden. Host your servers, databases, AI agents, and more on Railway.