Native browser embedding

NativeWebView

Embed the platform browser without shipping another Chromium runtime.

View on GitHub ↗Package ↗

StatusPreview

TierFlagship

DomainControls

Repositorywieslawsoltes/NativeWebView

Overview

A cross-platform Avalonia WebView using each operating system’s browser engine, with embedded, GPU-surface, offscreen, dialog, authentication, snapshot, native context-menu, zoom, profile-storage, and diagnostics workflows.

NativeWebView normalizes browser hosting without normalizing away platform capabilities. A common control selects a registered backend, while platform packages bind WebView2, WKWebView, WebKitGTK, mobile views, or browser hosting and expose snapshots, status text, zoom, profiles, context menus, and render diagnostics where supported.

Native platform engines

Embedded and offscreen modes

JavaScript messaging and extensible native context menus

Snapshots, status text, zoom, profiles, and diagnostics

Built for

Where it fits.

Avalonia apps embedding trusted web content
OAuth and system-browser authentication flows
Hybrid desktop tools that need low distribution weight

Compatibility & status

Windows / macOS / Linux

Control + dialog + auth

iOS / Android

Control + auth

Browser

Control + auth

Dialog on mobile/web

Unsupported

In the work

Real output,
not a mockup.

NativeWebView GitHub repository preview — The NativeWebView repository contains the current source, samples, releases, and issue history.

Architecture

Clear layers.
Replaceable seams.

Control

The Avalonia surface owns lifecycle, navigation, events, and render mode.

Core

Portable contracts cover backends, messaging, scripts, permissions, and navigation.

Platform

Each package binds the native browser engine and capability set.

Modes

Embedded, GPU-surface, and offscreen presentation fit different composition needs.

Operations

Snapshots, status text, zoom events, profiles, context menus, integrity metadata, and diagnostics expose native runtime behavior.

6 targetsplatform directions

3 modespresentation choices

Native engineno bundled Chromium

LiveGitHub metadata

Quick start

From package
to first frame.

Choose the package workflow used by your repository, then start from the smallest working example. Replace VERSION with the current stable or prerelease version shown on NuGet.

dotnet add package NativeWebView
dotnet add package NativeWebView.Platform.Windows

<PackageReference Include="NativeWebView" Version="VERSION" />

<PackageVersion Include="NativeWebView" Version="VERSION" />

NativeWebViewRuntime.EnsureCurrentPlatformRegistered();
var backend = NativeWebViewRuntime.CreateBackend();
var webView = new NativeWebView(backend);
await webView.InitializeAsync();
webView.Navigate(new Uri("https://example.com"));

Package surface

Start focused.
Compose as needed.

01NativeWebView

Avalonia control and cross-platform public API.

↗02NativeWebView.Core

Backend contracts, navigation, scripting, and messaging.

↗03NativeWebView.Platform.Windows

Windows WebView2 platform backend.

↗04NativeWebView.Auth

System-browser authentication flows.

↗

Source, docs, samples, and releases

The repository is the source of truth.

Use the current documentation and samples, inspect changes, report issues, or support continued open-source maintenance.

Documentation ↗Samples ↗Issues ↗Releases ↗Sponsor ↗

Next projectAvalonia Development Plugin→

A cross-platform Avalonia WebView using each operating system’s browser engine, with embedded, GPU-surface, offscreen, dialog, authentication, snapshot, native context-menu, zoom, profile-storage, and diagnostics workflows.

Where it fits.

Real output,not a mockup.

Clear layers.Replaceable seams.