Northstar Browser 1.0.3 released!
Today, 22 July 2026, we are pleased to announce the release of Northstar 1.0.3. Northstar is the free-software edition of the Nordstjernen project: a single-window, single-page, single-process desktop browser built from the same clean-room C engine, licensed under the GNU General Public License, version 3 or later. It runs on Linux, macOS and Windows.
Northstar Browser version 1.0.3 is available now! Read the full release notes here, or jump straight to the downloads.
about:start page — the “Open source edition” splash. more screenshots »what’s new in 1.0.3
- Media Queries Level 4. Full Media Queries Level 4 evaluation and serialization landed in the CSS engine.
- CSSOM used values. Inset properties (
top/right/bottom/left) now resolve to used values; box coordinates are unified across the layout engine and real scrollable overflow is computed. - Stricter conformance. CSS value and DOM name grammars are now enforced;
@supportsqueries and textarea state were aligned with the spec; text-control selection APIs match the standard; and Trusted Types plus CSS/HTML conformance were tightened. - Site compatibility. Better module, form and dynamic-CSS compatibility for real-world pages.
- Memory safety. A series of use-after-free fixes: DOM teardown paths in the JS bindings, the in-process framebuffer in single-process mode, cached DOM node pointers, and a clipboard-paste view reference in the GTK shell.
- Smoother rendering. Reflow loops are throttled and the text caret now blinks.
- Windows packaging. The Windows bundle now ships
LICENSE.txtat the root, and the start-page splash was regenerated for 1.0.3.
about Northstar
Free software. Northstar is licensed under the GNU GPL, version 3 or later — use it, read it, change it, share it.
One process, one page. All rendering happens in a single compact process — about 142,000 lines of original C, excluding the vendored WAMR, Wuffs and audio decoders — prioritizing auditability. On Linux it runs behind a Landlock filesystem sandbox (plus PR_SET_NO_NEW_PRIVS) with a default-deny seccomp syscall filter. No JIT.
Standards-first. The same engine lineage as Nordstjernen: lexbor for HTML/CSS, quickjs-ng for JavaScript, WAMR for WebAssembly, Wuffs for image decoding. Modern CSS (flex, grid, transforms, gradients, keyframes), Shadow DOM, custom elements, the Navigation API, service workers and WebExtensions with local persistence. Behaviour is measured against the spec text, section by section.
What it leaves out. Compared with Nordstjernen: no multi-window browsing, no per-tab renderer processes, and video lays out but does not decode. Audio playback (MP3, MP2, Ogg Opus/Vorbis, audio MSE streams) is included.
See the full comparison of Nordstjernen and Northstar on the home page.
news
22 JUL 2026 · Northstar 1.0.3 released — Media Queries Level 4, CSSOM used values, and use-after-free fixes. Release notes »
22 JUL 2026 · Nordstjernen 1.0.20 released — WebGL on by default, a blinking caret, site-compatibility and memory-safety work. Announcement » · Release notes »
19 JUL 2026 · Northstar 1.0.2 released. Release notes »
18 JUL 2026 · Northstar 1.0.1 released — the first public release of the GPL edition. Release notes »
download
Latest tagged release: Northstar 1.0.3 — released 22 July 2026. full release notes »
| Windows | northstar-1.0.3-windows-x86_64.zip |
|---|---|
| Source | 1.0.3.tar.gz · 1.0.3.zip |
| All releases | github.com/nordstjernen-web/northstar-browser/releases |
On Linux and macOS, build from source with meson — see the README for instructions.