A compatibility change requires matching client and server generations. App version differences alone do not.
- Desktop fullscreen now hides Surf's browser bar and gives the page the whole window. Player controls, Escape and F11 restore normal browsing on exit.
- Open your Surf tabs on the computer to sign in or change browser settings.
Choose Browser setup… in the tray or dashboard, or run
surf browser. - Connected devices show a paused screen. Close the setup windows to resume automatically, or choose Resume here on an iOS or desktop client and confirm that the computer's browser will close.
- Tabs, sign-ins and browser settings carry over using the same Surf profile. Pages reload when switching, so unsaved forms and active transfers may be lost. Completed downloads, bookmarks and history stay in place.
- With Surf stopped,
surf browserlets you configure its browser without starting a streaming server. Closing the setup windows exits the command. Usesurf browser --statusto check its state orsurf quitto close it. - Surf prevents two browsers from using its profile at once. If the setup browser will not close normally, a separate force-close confirmation lets you recover without closing unrelated browsers.
- Fixed Save & restart in the dashboard failing with a form-data error when changing the server name, port or other connection settings.
- Fixed a browser worker startup stall that prevented Facebook Reels and other features that depend on dedicated web workers from loading.
- Fixed live browser view startup failures caused by overlapping capture requests or requesting a new stream before releasing the existing one.
- Browser capture failures now report their cause promptly instead of waiting for video startup to time out. Capture can recover after transient errors.
Upgrade normally; no uninstall or data reset is needed. Compatibility remains generation 1. Existing clients can still connect; update the client to get the browser setup screen and remote resume controls.
- Added a Linux desktop client preview. Connect to a Surf server, pair with a code, and browse with tabs, bookmarks, history, downloads, clipboard, audio, and keyboard and mouse input. The server still runs the browser; this is a separate client, not a replacement for the desktop backend.
- The desktop client has compact controls, searchable Library views, an address bar with suggestions, and resolution presets for testing iPhone and iPad layouts. Window resizing updates the remote browser viewport.
- The iOS and Linux clients now share a small C99 core for session state, browser state and protocol handling. Their interfaces and device-specific rendering remain separate. Automated tests exercise the shared behavior, real desktop input, pairing and streaming to catch regressions earlier.
- Fixed downloads not starting after the browser-management changes.
- Download progress now clears when a transfer finishes or fails. Incomplete files are kept separate from completed downloads, and duplicate filenames no longer overwrite existing files.
- Fixed opening and saving downloads in both native clients, including names containing spaces or special characters. iOS transfers use bounded chunks to avoid loading a large file into memory at once.
- Restored native iOS Settings rows, controls and grouped sections, with clearer Library editing actions and fixes for backgrounds changing on scroll.
- Improved dark-mode contrast across popup frames, menus, search fields and address-bar controls. Classic iOS uses subdued toolbar icons.
- The backend dashboard now follows the Cydia repository page's visual style. Choose Light, Dark or System appearance; the repository page also follows the browser's light/dark preference where supported.
Upgrade normally; no uninstall or data reset is needed. Compatibility remains generation 1, so existing compatible clients and servers can still connect. The Linux client is a preview; the iOS client remains the established device app.
- Updates now install over the existing desktop and iOS packages. Browser data, settings, device keys, and the server identity stay in place.
- Client and server app versions may differ when their compatibility generation matches.
- Older iOS clients receive the package embedded in the backend. Newer clients require a backend update and are not downgraded.
- Builds verify the embedded package ID, version, compatibility generation, length, and SHA 256.
- Added
surf quitfor a clean shutdown of the desktop app or foreground server.
- Chrome and Edge launcher process handoff no longer causes a false Video Unavailable error.
- The server and Chromium now restart as one supervised unit after a browser failure.
- Chromium stays open between client sessions while capture stops when no client is connected.
- Tab, URL, website mode, and appearance state is saved after changes.
- Failed Windows profile recovery is retried on the next launch.
- Browser startup errors include a bounded tail of browser output.
AVSampleBufferDisplayLayervideo is available on iOS 6 and 7.- Video continues through keyboard transitions and falls back to the older renderer after repeated display failures.
- Fixed an iOS 6 crash when the address bar opened the keyboard.
- Restored separate icon artwork for iOS 6 and iOS 7 or later.
- iOS 8 and later sends compressed H.264 directly to the system display queue.
- Keyboard changes no longer rebuild the video surface.
- Queue recovery drops only independently decodable frames and replaces failed display layers.
- Diagnostics now report metrics for the active renderer.
- Native size 60 FPS video uses a 16 Mbit/s variable bitrate by default.
- Compatibility generation 1, originally
20260831-1.
- Reworked the iOS browser controls, tabs, new tab page, Library, pairing, Reader, media controls, and settings.
- Replaced drawn symbols with Lucide icons and adopted the Deta Surf artwork.
- Added a compact iPad browser bar that can sit at the top or bottom.
- Tabs now scroll continuously and show current page titles.
- More is now a browser menu. The system share sheet opens only from Share.
- Reorganized Settings and replaced the Performance Monitor.
- Added a dark appearance and Chromium color scheme preference.
- Fixed stale tab titles, loading state, navigation state, and tab state.
- Compatibility generation
20260826-1. Client and server must match.
- Added the Cydia and Sileo repository at seg6.space/surf.
- Added installer links to desktop pairing, terminal pairing, and the README.
- Release publishing verifies package hashes and the signed release source.
- Backgrounding the iOS app now pauses media, clipboard checks, and diagnostics.
- The connection stays open for one minute before disconnecting.
- Chromium started with the first client and stopped two minutes after the last client disconnected.
- Tabs, website mode, cookies, and storage survived idle shutdown.
- Added browser lifecycle diagnostics and
SURF_BROWSER_IDLE_TIMEOUT. - The supervised lifecycle in 0.15.4 later replaced this model.
- The iOS app now opens a playback audio session before creating its queue.
- Diagnostics distinguish silent capture from transport and playback failures.
- Switching website mode no longer disables DOM touch or Pointer Events.
- Browser tests cover inertial scrolling and native HTML selects.
- Keyboard intent now follows the full interaction started by a touch.
- HTML selects use a native picker with multiple selection and frame support.
- Compatibility generation
20260809-4.
- Autofocus and script focus no longer open the iOS keyboard.
- Compatibility generation
20260809-3.
- Added clipboard sync and one time text delivery.
- Added Paste, Escape, and Tab controls above the iOS keyboard.
- Combined desktop, server, and iOS logs into one bounded structured format.
- Added the log viewer and
surf logs. - Renamed
surf daemontosurf serve. - Added
surf serve --pair. - Unified restart and shutdown handling across supported hosts.
- Compatibility generation
20260809-2.
- Chromium software H.264 became the default for consistent old iOS decoding.
- GPU page rendering and composition remain enabled.
- Removed the virtual GPU, X11, forced software rendering, and shared memory launch modes.
- Chromium now uses one headless configuration with host GPU rendering.
- Increased capture and iOS presentation from 30 to 60 FPS.
- Reduced presentation buffering to two frames.
- Raised fallback H.264 bitrate to 48 Mbit/s.
- Release builds now reuse unchanged toolchains and Go outputs.
- Windows installers are built in a pinned container.
- Desktop tray bindings are now pinned and platform independent.
- Linux can build Linux, Windows, Intel Mac, and Apple Silicon Mac packages.
- iOS and desktop releases now come from one signed tag workflow.
- Added Linux based macOS archives and NSIS Windows installers.
- Fixed touch IDs that caused scrolling to lose momentum over time.
- Input timestamps now reflect backend dispatch.
- The final touch position is delivered before release.
- Added Chromium tests for fling behavior and touch ID reuse.
- Replaced synthetic gestures with the device touch contacts.
- Added bounded touch snapshots, stable contact IDs, and stale gesture cancellation.
- Page handlers no longer block later touch input.
- Focus events now work through open shadow roots and embedded frames.
- Added iOS marked text composition and field specific keyboard layouts.
- Compatibility generation
20260806-1.
- Added Cloudflare Tunnel transport with an inner pinned Surf TLS connection.
- Saved servers can keep separate LAN and roaming addresses.
- Added transport limits and endpoint verification deadlines.
- Replaced iOS text logs with bounded structured events and a log viewer.
- Added clearer DNS, TLS, transport, and identity errors.
- Logs omit credentials, query strings, tickets, and full URLs.
- Browser identity detection now waits for the page environment on slow ARM64 hosts.
- The check uses a private local address.
- Surf now removes only the
HeadlessChromeproduct marker. - Browser name, version, platform, and Client Hints remain unchanged.
- Mobile Websites changes device facing fields only.
- Failed identity detection leaves the browser identity untouched.
- Capture and content blocking extensions now load through the DevTools API.
- Surf prefers compatible Chrome before Edge or Chromium.
- Added a live Widevine EME capability test.
- Pairing codes now prefer
SURF_PUBLIC_ADDRESS.
- Windows installers stop Surf and Chromium before replacing files.
- Silent updates start the new version after installation.
- Forced desktop shutdown no longer leaves the server, Chromium, listener, or live lock behind.
- Startup removes dead runtime records and verifies processes before takeover.
- Invalid settings and device files are preserved while affected state is repaired.
- Repeated Chromium failures move the profile aside and retry with clean browser state.
- Windows startup failures now return a nonzero status to the desktop app.
- The Windows tray can adopt an authenticated server that is already running.
- Server restart uses bounded backoff and records process events.
- The installer closes old Surf and Chromium processes before launch.
- Replaced shared passwords and plaintext connections with pinned TLS and separate device keys.
- Added QR and manual pairing invitations.
- Added an iOS 6 QR decoder and camera improvements.
- Forget Server now revokes the device when the backend is reachable.
- Added identity change errors, multiple verified addresses, rename, forget, and pair again controls.
- Sessions are kept in memory and bound to the server identity.
- Added
surf status,surf pair, and device management commands. - Moved network routes under
/api/v1. - Added secure reconnect handling and tab favicons.
- Raised H.264 detail to QP 12 with a 24 Mbit/s fallback at 30 FPS.
- Rotation and fullscreen now resize without reconnecting.
- Page fullscreen and native fullscreen now stay in sync.
- This release changed the client and server protocol.
- Added native phone and iPod touch layouts.
- Reworked browser controls around classic Safari.
- Split Share and More, moved Settings, and added a fullscreen phone Library.
- Added bounded tab previews.
- Added separate iOS 6 and iOS 7 or later visual styles.
- Added armv7 and arm64 package checks.
- Added Microsoft Edge discovery and Widevine reporting.
- Hardened the iOS 6 OpenGL renderer.
- Video now survives rotation and fullscreen changes.
- Restored Chromium tab audio on Linux without playing it on the host.
- Fixed rotated and letterboxed video.
- Audio only sessions can add video and survive encoder restarts.
- Added browser profile locking and improved Chromium cleanup.
- Capture now keeps the newest frame and reports motion diagnostics.
- Added Intel and Apple Silicon Mac packages.
- Improved text and detail in streamed pages.
- Replaced screenshots and external FFmpeg capture with Chromium tab capture.
- Added active tab audio on Linux, Windows, and macOS.
- Unified runtime and package ownership around the new capture path.
- Matched capture timing to the client display cadence.
- Added browser audio capture on Windows.
- Added bookmarks, history, downloads, settings, media controls, and Mobile Websites.
- Added touch browsing, performance diagnostics, content blocking, and 30 FPS H.264 defaults.
- Reduced H.264 delay and allowed overlapping VideoToolbox decoding.
- Added optional NVIDIA NVENC encoding.
- Interrupted iOS client updates can now recover.
- Backends may offer a newer compatible iOS client without an exact app version match.
- Fixed iOS update metadata produced by ARM64 Linux builders.
- Added Linux ARM64 packages and Docker deployment.
- The iOS updater no longer replaces itself while running.
- Removed duplicate CI release builds.
- iOS updates now verify the installed package before reporting success.
- Added iOS performance diagnostics for decode, display, frame age, and input latency.
- Added one
surfprogram for the desktop app and foreground server. - Added verified desktop and iOS update metadata.
- Added managed Chromium discovery and desktop packages for Linux, Windows, and macOS.
- Expanded package validation.
- Combined the desktop supervisor and backend in
surf. - Desktop mode became the default.
surf serveremained available for servers. - Added packages for all desktop platforms.
- Standardized video on H.264.
- Matched iOS presentation to the display refresh rate.
- Added Chromium process management and Windows capture.
- Added a standalone Linux server.
- Added browser discovery, diagnostics, and host audio support.
- Made high detail H.264 the default.
- Split tabs, input, browser control, and media paths.
- Added editable saved server settings to iOS.
- Required password authentication and expiring WebSocket tickets.
- Restricted diagnostics and uploads.
- Pinned the iOS build toolchain.
- Added the backend, iOS client, container image, and release workflow.