Manually Install Camoufox Bypassing npm | Generated by AI

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Manually Installing Camoufox to Bypass Slow npm Downloads

Problem: npm install on @askjo/camofox-browser stalls trying to download a ~627 MB browser binary.

Fix: Drop the binary directly into the cache dir camoufox-js already looks in.

Step 1 — Identify Your Arch

uname -m

Output	Arch	Zip to download
`x86_64`	Intel/AMD Linux	`camoufox-146.0.1-alpha.25-lin.x86_64.zip`
`aarch64`	ARM64 / Apple M / Pi	`camoufox-146.0.1-alpha.25-lin.arm64.zip`
`arm64`	macOS Apple Silicon	`camoufox-146.0.1-alpha.50-mac.arm64.zip`

Step 2 — Download the Zip

Get it from daijro/camoufox releases, not apify/camoufox-js (that’s just the JS wrapper, no binaries inside).

Step 3 — Extract to the Cache Dir

mkdir -p ~/.cache/camoufox
cd ~/.cache/camoufox
unzip -o /path/to/camoufox-146.0.1-alpha.25-lin.x86_64.zip

The cache dir location is hardcoded in camoufox-js:

OS	Path
Linux	`~/.cache/camoufox/`
macOS	`~/Library/Caches/camoufox/`
Windows	`%LOCALAPPDATA%\camoufox\camoufox\Cache\`

Step 4 — Create `version.json`

The zip doesn’t include this — the official installer writes it. Without it, camoufox-js refuses to recognize the binary.

Find the version by running the binary after extraction:

$ ~/.cache/camoufox/camoufox --version
Camoufox Camoufox 146.0.1-beta.25

Split at the last hyphen:

// ~/.cache/camoufox/version.json
{"version":"146.0.1","release":"beta.25"}

Step 5 — Verify

$ ls ~/.cache/camoufox/
camoufox  camoufox-bin  camoufox.cfg  browser/  fonts/  libxul.so  omni.ja  version.json ...

$ ~/.cache/camoufox/camoufox --version
Camoufox Camoufox 146.0.1-beta.25

Step 6 — Install Without Downloading

cd ~/projects/camofox-browser
npm install --ignore-scripts   # skips the slow postinstall
npm start                      # launches immediately

Why It Works

camoufox-js calls installedVerStr() → Version.fromPath() which checks:

~/.cache/camoufox/ exists and isn’t empty
~/.cache/camoufox/version.json is present and valid
The version is within the supported range

If all pass → returns the cache dir path as the browser location. No download needed.

Gotcha

The zip is named alpha.25 but the binary self-reports as beta.25. Always use the binary’s own --version output for the version.json fields.

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