Replacing .NET WebBrowser control with a better browser, like Chrome?

user_61905 0
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Is there any relatively easy way to insert a modern browser into a .NET application?

As far as I understand, the WebBrowser control is a wrapper for IE, which wouldn't be a problem except that it looks like it is a very old version of IE, with all that entails in terms of CSS screw-ups, potential security risks (if the rendering engine wasn't patched, can I really expect the zillion buffer overflow problems to be fixed?), and other issues.

I am using Visual Studio C# (express edition - does it make any difference here?)

I would like to integrate a good web browser in my applications. In some, I just use it to handle the user registration process, interface with some of my website's features and other things of that order, but I have another application in mind that will require more err... control.

I need:

  • A browser that can integrate inside a window of my application (not a separate window)
  • A good support for CSS, js and other web technologies, on par with any modern browser
  • Basic browser functions like "navigate", "back", "reload"...
  • Liberal access to the page code and output.

I was thinking about Chrome, since it comes under the BSD license, but I would be just as happy with a recent version of IE.

As much as possible, I would like to keep things simple. The best would be if one could patch the existing WebBrowser control, which does already about 70% of what I need, but I don't think that's possible.

I have found an activeX control for Mozilla (http://www.iol.ie/~locka/mozilla/control.htm) but it looks like it's an old version, so it's not necessarily an improvement.

I am open to suggestions

webbrowser-control winforms .net c#
8 Answers

Chrome uses (a fork of) Webkit if you didn't know, which is also used by Safari. Here's a few questions that are of the same vein:

The webkit one isn't great as the other answer states, one version no longer works (the google code one) and the Mono one is experimental. It'd be nice if someone made the effort to make a decent .NET wrapper for it but it's not something anyone seems to want to do - which is surprising given it now has support for HTML5 and so many other features that the IE(8) engine lacks.

Update (2014)

There's new dual-licensed project that allows you embed Chrome into your .NET applications called Awesomium. It comes with a .NET api but requires quite a few hacks for rendering (the examples draw the browser window to a buffer, paint the buffer as an image and refresh on a timer).

I think this is the browser used by Origin in Battlefield 3.

Update (2016)

There is now DotnetBrowser, a commercial alternative to Awesomium. It's based off Chromium.

user_215740

UPDATE 2020 JULY

Chromium based WebView 2 is released by the Microsoft. Now you can embed new Chromium Edge browser into a .NET application.

UPDATE 2018 MAY

If you're targeting an application to run on Windows 10 or a later version, then now you can embed Edge browser into your .NET application by using Windows Community Toolkit.

WPF Example:

  1. Install Windows Community Toolkit Nuget Package

    Install-Package Microsoft.Toolkit.Win32.UI.Controls

  2. XAML Code

    <Window
    x:Class="WebViewTest.MainWindow"
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
    xmlns:WPF="clr-namespace:Microsoft.Toolkit.Win32.UI.Controls.WPF;assembly=Microsoft.Toolkit.Win32.UI.Controls"
    xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008"
    xmlns:local="clr-namespace:WebViewTest"
    xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006"
    Title="MainWindow"
    Width="800"
    Height="450"
    mc:Ignorable="d">
    <Grid>
        <WPF:WebView x:Name="wvc" />
    </Grid>
</Window>

  3. CS Code:

    public partial class MainWindow : Window
{
  public MainWindow()
  {
    InitializeComponent();

    // You can also use the Source property here or in the WPF designer
    wvc.Navigate(new Uri("https://www.microsoft.com"));
  }
}

WinForms Example:

public partial class Form1 : Form
{
  public Form1()
  {
    InitializeComponent();

    // You can also use the Source property here or in the designer
    webView1.Navigate(new Uri("https://www.microsoft.com"));
  }
}

Please refer to this link for more information.

user_35816430
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