A PhantomJS alternative for screenshots & PDFs

PhantomJS was the first headless browser most of us used, and plenty of production systems still call phantomjs rasterize.js. But development was suspended in 2018 once headless Chrome shipped, the GitHub repository is archived, and its QtWebKit engine predates flexbox fixes, CSS grid and ES2015 JavaScript.

Symptoms you've outgrown it

• Modern sites render blank or half-built, because their JavaScript bundles use syntax PhantomJS can't parse (arrow functions, let, class, Promises without a polyfill).
• HTTPS pages fail with SSL handshake errors: the bundled TLS stack is too old for many servers.
• Grid and flex layouts come out stacked or overlapping, and web fonts are missing.
• You keep a legacy binary or Docker image around just for screenshots, and security reviews keep flagging it.

The replacements, honestly compared

Option	Good for / trade-off
Puppeteer (Node)	Closest to the PhantomJS scripting model, same engine as Chrome. You run and patch headless Chromium (~300MB, memory spikes, fonts).
Playwright (Node, Python, Java, .NET)	Chromium, Firefox and WebKit; great for test suites (CasperJS users). Same operating burden as Puppeteer.
A hosted API (Shotmint, ScreenshotOne, Urlbox, …)	Screenshots and PDFs with one HTTP call from any language, nothing to install. Costs per render; no multi-step scripted flows (logins, clicks).

If your PhantomJS scripts drive tests or click through pages, move them to Playwright. If they only turn a URL or HTML into a PNG or PDF (which is what most rasterize.js setups do), an API call replaces the whole binary.

Before and after

// Before: rasterize.js (run with: phantomjs rasterize.js URL out.png)
var page = require("webpage").create();
var system = require("system");
page.viewportSize = { width: 1280, height: 800 };
page.open(system.args[1], function (status) {
  window.setTimeout(function () {
    page.render(system.args[2]);
    phantom.exit();
  }, 500);
});

# After: one HTTP call (Chromium). PhantomJS captured the full page by default.
curl -G https://shotmint.creasework.com/v1/screenshot \
  -H "X-API-Key: $SHOTMINT_KEY" \
  --data-urlencode "url=https://example.com" \
  -d width=1280 -d full_page=true -d delay=500 \
  -o out.png

Node.js

const params = new URLSearchParams({ url: "https://example.com", width: "1280", full_page: "true" });
const r = await fetch("https://shotmint.creasework.com/v1/screenshot?" + params, {
  headers: { "X-API-Key": process.env.SHOTMINT_KEY },
});
if (!r.ok) throw new Error(await r.text());
require("fs").writeFileSync("out.png", Buffer.from(await r.arrayBuffer()));

Python (PDF, replacing page.paperSize)

import os, requests
r = requests.get("https://shotmint.creasework.com/v1/pdf",
    headers={"X-API-Key": os.environ["SHOTMINT_KEY"]},
    params={"url": "https://example.com", "format": "A4", "margin": "1cm"}, timeout=60)
r.raise_for_status()
open("out.pdf", "wb").write(r.content)

Option mapping

PhantomJS	Shotmint
page.viewportSize = {width, height}	width, height
page.render() (whole page by default)	full_page=true (without it you get just the viewport)
page.clipRect = {top, left, width, height}	selector=#element to capture one element, or width/height for the top of the page
page.zoomFactor = 2	device_scale_factor=2 (sharp retina output, not just scaled)
page.render(f, {format: "jpeg", quality: "80"})	format=jpeg (or webp), quality=80
page.render("out.pdf") with page.paperSize = {format, orientation, margin}	/v1/pdf with format, landscape=true, margin
page.settings.userAgent	user_agent
window.setTimeout(render, ms)	delay=ms, or wait_until=networkidle
page.content = html / page.setContent()	html in a POST body
page.evaluate() to hide elements	hide_selectors=.cookie-banner,#chat
paperSize.header / footer callbacks	Not supported. Put them in your HTML; a <thead> repeats on every page

Migration gotchas

• Viewport vs full page: PhantomJS rendered the full document height unless you set clipRect. Chromium-based tools capture the viewport by default, so add full_page=true to keep old output sizes.
• Transparent backgrounds: PhantomJS left pages with no background transparent in PNGs. Chromium paints white; pass omit_background=true for transparency.
• Fonts and text size: Chromium has a different font stack and real web-font support, so text width changes slightly. Re-check tight layouts.
• PDF media: PhantomJS rendered PDFs with screen CSS. Chromium uses print CSS; pass screen_media=true to keep the on-screen look.

Want to compare the output first? Try the free full-page screenshot tool or URL to PDF (no key needed). Moving off a different stack? See the wkhtmltopdf and Puppeteer guides.

What it costs

One screenshot or PDF = one credit. €5 buys 2,000 renders, credits never expire and there's no subscription. Failed renders are refunded automatically.