--- title: beginner-jhj/mini_browser | daily.dev description: A high school student built a functional browser engine from scratch in C++ over 8 weeks to understand how browsers work internally. The project implements... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/beginner-jhj-mini-browser-sskwnuv7s twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: beginner-jhj/mini_browser | daily.dev og:description: A high school student built a functional browser engine from scratch in C++ over 8 weeks to understand how browsers work internally. The project implements... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/beginner-jhj-mini-browser-sskwnuv7s og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/sskwNUv7S.png og:image:alt: beginner-jhj/mini_browser og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # beginner-jhj/mini_browser **[Hacker News](https://daily.dev/sources/hn)** · 14 min read · 69 upvotes · 3 comments ## Summary A high school student built a functional browser engine from scratch in C++ over 8 weeks to understand how browsers work internally. The project implements HTML/CSS parsing, DOM tree construction, layout calculation, and rendering using Qt6. It covers the complete browser rendering pipeline: tokenization, DOM construction, style calculation (CSSOM), layout computation, and painting. The implementation supports core CSS properties, image loading with caching, navigation with history, and handles both block and inline layouts. Beyond technical achievements, the author emphasizes lessons in systematic debugging, persistence, pragmatism over perfection, and the importance of asking "why" when learning. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Community discussion Top comments from developers on daily.dev. **@einswilli** · 11 upvotes > Projects like this matter less for what they produce and more for what they teach. > > Building a browser from scratch forces real understanding of systems, not just APIs. > That mindset will carry much further than any specific tech stack. **@ahmdrza** · 2 upvotes > so cool **@hasnatamir** · 0 upvotes > Thats actually impressive. ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [The web in 1000 lines of C \(Maurycy's blog\)](https://daily.dev/posts/the-web-in-1000-lines-of-c-maurycy-s-blog--awma4dpai) · Lobsters · 2 upvotes · 0 comments - [cwbrowser — a browser engine written from scratch in Zig](https://daily.dev/posts/cwbrowser-a-browser-engine-written-from-scratch-in-zig-t3bozgh0t) · Hacker News · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [QT6 Brings BASIC To The Web Browser, Or Your Computer](https://daily.dev/posts/qt6-brings-basic-to-the-web-browser-or-your-computer-2ev2uvgso) · Hackaday · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [From Code to Pixels: The Rendering Pipeline](https://daily.dev/posts/from-code-to-pixels-the-rendering-pipeline-4m5zvntkn) · JavaScript in Plain English · 5 upvotes · 1 comments --- Tags: [#c](https://daily.dev/tags/c), [#c++](https://daily.dev/tags/c++), [#css](https://daily.dev/tags/css) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/beginner-jhj-mini-browser-sskwnuv7s) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"beginner-jhj/mini_browser","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/beginner-jhj-mini-browser-sskwnuv7s","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/beginner-jhj-mini-browser-sskwnuv7s"},"datePublished":"2026-01-28T19:53:53.418Z","dateModified":"2026-03-15T06:07:54.745Z","description":"A high school student built a functional browser engine from scratch in C++ over 8 weeks to understand how browsers work internally. The project implements...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/c5dd08543f291868582477ed806872f4?_a=AQAEulh","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/c5dd08543f291868582477ed806872f4?_a=AQAEulh","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"Hacker News","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Hacker News","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/hn","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/hn"},"commentCount":3,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/beginner-jhj-mini-browser-sskwnuv7s","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":69},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":3}],"keywords":"c,c++,css","timeRequired":"PT14M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Hacker News","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/hn"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"beginner-jhj/mini_browser"}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/beginner-jhj-mini-browser-sskwnuv7s","comment":[{"@type":"Comment","text":"Projects like this matter less for what they produce and more for what they teach.\nBuilding a browser from scratch forces real understanding of systems, not just APIs.\nThat mindset will carry much further than any specific tech stack.","datePublished":"2026-02-03T23:10:14.833Z","dateModified":"2026-02-06T10:41:51.067Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/sskwNUv7S#c-qAyM0G02N","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Einswilli","url":"https://daily.dev/einswilli","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--bHbHjhaQ--/f_auto/v1769979201/avatars/avatar_VddnKjAvfaGEuixFzwBIW?_a=BAMAMiiu0"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":11}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"so cool","datePublished":"2026-02-09T19:39:47.632Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/sskwNUv7S#c-iseCpamdw","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Ahmad Raza","url":"https://daily.dev/ahmdrza","image":"https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/a-/AOh14GgglD4dTEiqB7uLMez-1WrR-KzAAHVAzyL1o6Btdw=s100"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":2}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"Thats actually impressive.","datePublished":"2026-02-24T21:02:44.004Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/sskwNUv7S#c-Rn5stD2bE","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Hasnat Amir","url":"https://daily.dev/hasnatamir","image":"https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/a/ACg8ocKPhYJE21gqGZH9Y9fZ4NqzPy6m8PxCxVjDoXKcgNvTgz-xh95_1w=s96-c"}}]} ```