undetected-chromedriver

What it is and what it does

undetected-chromedriver is a patched version of Selenium's Chrome WebDriver designed to bypass automated bot-detection systems. It intercepts and modifies the driver binary to remove or mask telltale signs of automation that services like Cloudflare, Imperva, and DataDome use to block scrapers and bots. The package automatically downloads the appropriate driver version for your Chrome installation and applies the patches at runtime.

It works as a drop-in replacement for Selenium's standard Chrome driver, supporting Brave and other Chromium-based browsers with minimal code changes. However, it does not hide your IP address or improve your IP reputation; running from a datacenter or with a low-reputation IP will still trigger detection. The package is distributed under GPL-3.0, meaning any code using it must also be open-source.

Use it for:

• Scraping websites protected by Cloudflare, Imperva, or similar bot-detection services when you have legitimate access rights.
• Automating browser interactions on sites that block standard Selenium WebDriver without triggering detection alerts.
• Testing web applications' anti-bot defenses by simulating realistic automated browser behavior.
• Running automated tests on Chromium-based browsers (including Brave) where standard WebDriver detection would fail.
• Building open-source web automation tools that need to evade detection without relying on proprietary solutions.

Worth the install?

AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page — verify before relying

Patches Selenium's Chrome WebDriver to avoid triggering anti-bot detection services, automatically downloading and modifying the driver binary to work with Chromium-based browsers.

Yes, with conditions. Install if you need to automate Chromium browsers against anti-bot services and your project is open-source or can comply with GPL-3.0. Avoid if you need proprietary licensing, require frequent maintenance updates, or depend on cutting-edge Selenium features. The high install friction (binary patching at runtime) and aging maintenance status (909 days since last release) mean you should verify that the anti-detection patches still work for your target sites before committing to it.

Install

undetected-chromedriver on PyPI

pip install undetected-chromedriver

uv add undetected-chromedriver

poetry add undetected-chromedriver

Installing undetected-chromedriver

Before you install

High install friction: the package downloads and patches a Chrome driver binary at runtime, requiring network access and system-level modifications. Last release was 909 days ago; the repository remains active with recent commits but maintenance appears infrequent.

License in practice

Licensed under GPL-3.0 (copyleft). Any code that imports and uses this package must also be distributed under a compatible open-source license; proprietary or closed-source projects cannot legally use it.

Quickstart

import undetected_chromedriver as uc

driver = uc.Chrome(headless=True)
driver.get('https://example.com')
driver.save_screenshot('page.png')
driver.quit()

Requires Chrome or a Chromium-based browser installed on the system; the package downloads and patches the driver binary at first use, which may fail without network access or sufficient disk space.

Verify before relying

• Whether the anti-detection patches remain effective against current versions of Distill Network, Imperva, DataDome, and similar services.
• Compatibility with Selenium versions beyond 4.9 and whether the pinned dependency constraint limits future upgrades.
• Whether headless mode detection evasion (mentioned as 'unsupported' in the changelog) is reliable in production.

Package facts

Evidence: undetected-chromedriver-3.5.5.tar.gz

Tags

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Further reading