helium
by imputnet
Helium is a desktop web browser built on Chromium that focuses on privacy and user consent. It includes a customised uBlock Origin ad blocker and is available for macOS, Linux and Windows.
Worth a lookEstablished, with a few things to check (listed below).
- Stars
- 22.2k +35 a day
- Licence
- GPL-3.0
- Runs on
- Your computer
- Setup
- Easy
- Language
- C++
- Age
- 623 days
What you can do with it
- Browse the web with Chromium compatibility and fewer trackers
- Block ads and tracking with the built-in uBlock Origin fork
- Self-host the supporting services such as updates, filter lists and !bangs
Ways a business could use it
- Give staff a privacy-focused browser with built-in ad blocking, without paying for a separate blocking product
- Use it as a separate browser profile for client work, keeping tracking away from research and logins
Can you use it commercially?
Free to use. Anything you distribute that includes it must be open-sourced under the same licence.
Not legal advice. Read the project's licence file before building a product on it.
Getting it running
Download the installer for macOS, Linux or Windows from helium.computer or the GitHub releases pages.
Follow the official instructions in the project README.
Things to check
- Still in beta, so unexpected issues may occur
- Security patches depend on the maintainers keeping up with Chromium releases
- Automatic updates are only supported on macOS and Windows
Checked 01 Nov 2026. Summary drafted by AI from the project's README.
