{"version":"2.1.283","anchor":"artifact-preview-now-switches-itself-off-when-no-chromechro","canonical_anchor":"artifact-preview-now-switches-itself-off-when-no-chromechro","heading":"Artifact preview stays off when no Chrome, Chromium or Edge browser is found","tier":"use","area":"Artifacts","url":"https:\/\/changelogs.core-directive.com\/v\/2.1.283\/e\/artifact-preview-now-switches-itself-off-when-no-chromechro","release_url":"https:\/\/changelogs.core-directive.com\/v\/2.1.283","markdown":"### Artifact preview stays off when no Chrome, Chromium or Edge browser is found\n\nArtifact preview now needs a browser found at startup, unless CLAUDE_CODE_ARTIFACT_PREVIEW is explicitly true\n\n**Unclear.** It is not clear whether artifact preview is included in public builds of Claude Code at all.\n\n**What**\n\nArtifact preview renders a page locally and returns screenshots of it. It is now offered only when Claude Code finds a browser to render with:\n\n- At startup Claude Code searches in the background for Chrome, Chromium or Edge, including Playwright installs and the locations in `BUN_CHROME_PATH` and `PLAYWRIGHT_BROWSERS_PATH`.\n\n- If the search finds no browser, preview stays off.\n\n- Setting `CLAUDE_CODE_ARTIFACT_PREVIEW=true` explicitly skips this requirement.\n\n- The search result is reported as `tengu_artifact_preview_browser`, and failures are logged, for example \"Artifact preview: the startup browser search failed:\".\n\nThe underlying switch is unchanged: `CLAUDE_CODE_ARTIFACT_PREVIEW`, or the server flag `tengu_cobalt_plinth_aspen` when the variable is not set, which falls back to off. Nothing has been read about that flag.\n\n**Why**\n\nIf you have preview turned on but no browser installed, Claude is no longer offered a preview action that could not work.\n\n- Flag `tengu_cobalt_plinth_aspen`: Not enough to say (read for one account on one subscription tier against v2.1.283; this account: no value returned, anonymous baseline: no value returned, compiled default: off) These values were read against a different version of Claude Code, so treat them as the nearest reading available instead of one taken on this release.\n- Area: Artifacts\n- Names: `BUN_CHROME_PATH`, `PLAYWRIGHT_BROWSERS_PATH`\n- Tier: Use it now\n- Useful: 3\/5\n- Signal: 3\/5"}