nordstjernen

Nordstjernen is an independent, lightweight web browser built entirely from scratch in C. A hardened, zero-JIT HTML5 / CSS / JavaScript rendering engine with a clean-room engine — not Blink, not WebKit, not Gecko.

Cold-starts in milliseconds, idles at a few tens of MB, and ships no telemetry of any kind — no phone-home, no update pinger, no crash reports, no “studies”. Privacy is on by default: partitioned cookies, third-party cookies off, HSTS, CSP and mixed-content blocking. Built in Norway.

Nordstjernen rendering the about:nordstjernen page on Linux / GTK 4.

news

31 MAY 2026 · Nordstjernen 0.8.1 released. Release notes »

28 MAY 2026 · Nordstjernen 0.8.0 released. Release notes »

24 MAY 2026 · Nordstjernen 0.7.0 released. Release notes »

specifications

language	C · ~50 kLOC, fully auditable
html / css	lexbor 3.0.0 (parser, WHATWG URL, selectors)
javascript	quickjs-ng v0.14.0 — bytecode interpreter, no JIT (W^X holds process-wide)
images	Wuffs v0.4 (PNG / GIF / BMP / JPEG)
ui	GTK 4 · one window per page, no tab strip
network	libcurl · HTTP/2 · gzip + brotli + zstd
hardening	Landlock + seccomp sandbox · PIE · full RELRO · Intel CET · no JIT
privacy	no telemetry · partitioned cookies · HSTS / CSP / mixed-content blocking
platforms	linux · windows · macos
license	NSL-1.0 → MIT after 10 years

download

Latest tagged release: Nordstjernen 0.8.1 — released 31 May 2026. full release notes »

For platform-specific builds, use the nightly builds. They are rebuilt from main each night and point at the latest code — bleeding edge, expect rough edges.

Windows	nordstjernen-windows-x86_64.zip
macOS	nordstjernen-macos.dmg
Debian	nordstjernen-debian-amd64.deb
Ubuntu	nordstjernen-ubuntu-amd64.deb
openSUSE	nordstjernen-opensuse-x86_64.rpm
Linux (portable)	nordstjernen-linux-x86_64.zip
Alpine (musl)	nordstjernen-alpine-x86_64.apk · .zip
Java API (JDK 21)	nordstjernen-java.jar · sources · javadoc · API docs
Source	nordstjernen-src.tar.xz
Checksums	SHA256SUMS · all nightly files