How can I set up & run PhantomJS on Ubuntu?

Question

I set up PhantomJS and recorded it to video: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/xnizmh_1_webcam

Build instructions: http://phantomjs.org/build.html

Is there anything wrong in my setup?

After I set it up I read the quick start tutorial and tried to write this code

phantomjs hello.js

It gives me "command not found" error. How can I solve this problem?

Try this answer http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6448459/phantomjs-not-working — Alex, Jan 08 '12 at 15:07
thank you i solved the problem. The problem is i dont have softlink for my program. Thanks for ur help :) — FURKAN ILGIN, Jan 08 '12 at 18:11
https://www.vultr.com/docs/how-to-install-phantomjs-on-ubuntu-16-04 — Stack Underflow, Sep 13 '19 at 17:06

score 361 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 13 '16 at 08:08

361

Guidouil's answer put me on the right track. I had to add one additional symlink to /usr/bin/, and I did direct symlinks for all 3 - see below.

I'm installing on Ubuntu server Natty Narwhal.

This is exactly what I did.

cd /usr/local/share
sudo wget https://bitbucket.org/ariya/phantomjs/downloads/phantomjs-1.9.7-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2
sudo tar xjf phantomjs-1.9.7-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2
sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs-1.9.7-linux-x86_64/bin/phantomjs /usr/local/share/phantomjs
sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs-1.9.7-linux-x86_64/bin/phantomjs /usr/local/bin/phantomjs
sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs-1.9.7-linux-x86_64/bin/phantomjs /usr/bin/phantomjs

And finally when I do

phantomjs -v

I get 1.9.7

If anyone sees any problems with what I've done, please let me know.

edited Jun 13 '16 at 08:08

Pierre.Vriens

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answered Jan 10 '13 at 21:08

shawn

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if you need that final sym link it is because you don't have /usr/local/bin in your PATH – DrewB Jan 11 '13 at 17:46
I am getting error on this command sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs-1.8.1-linux-x86_64/bin/phantomjs /usr/local/bin/phantomjs ln: creating symbolic link `/usr/local/bin/phantomjs': No such file or directory – Amar Banerjee Jun 10 '13 at 15:39
Please check before downloading the tar file via terminal: uname -i – Shakil Ahmed Jul 10 '13 at 17:53
@AmarBanerjee you need to use sudo in front of the previous and while unwrapping the tar ball. – Shane Aug 03 '13 at 07:57
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This works, but can anyone explain to me why shouldn't we just copy paste the whole thing into `usr/bin` instead of creating a link to `/usr/local`? – Heisenberg Nov 02 '13 at 05:36
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Anyone get permission denied too? – User Mar 01 '14 at 01:31
Thank you for this prebuild link, as i coulnt get it to build on Ubuntu – tristanbailey Mar 24 '14 at 09:37
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For phantomjs to be available from any directory, it is enough if you add a symlink to one of the directories listed in your $PATH variable. (run "echo $PATH" to see which they are). – Juampy NR Mar 24 '14 at 10:23
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I ran into this issue: bin/phantomjs: error while loading shared libraries: libfontconfig.so.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory. I found a fix [here](https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs/issues/10904). Run the command: `sudo apt-get install libfontconfig` – Neil Hoff Apr 14 '14 at 15:54
Nice answer mate. I knew that but I was not dare to do that. Your answer encourages me and it is on progress. – kta Jun 01 '16 at 06:33
I put these commands in my CI build steps. They worked fine…until the CI server started getting 403 errors from bitbucket.org. (I'm guessing it's rate-limiting.) So I found [this SO post](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/39533707/bitbucket-rate-limiting-phantomjs#39533708) and changed the URL to `https://cnpmjs.org/mirrors/phantomjs/phantomjs-2.1.1-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2`. – Jeff Terrell Ph.D. Mar 21 '17 at 00:08
could you please chek this too https://stackoverflow.com/questions/44624964/phantom-js-on-web-project – Manik Jun 19 '17 at 08:04

score 114 · Answer 2 · edited Feb 02 '17 at 04:05

114

PhantomJS is on npm. You can run this command to install it globally:

npm install -g phantomjs-prebuilt

phantomjs -v should return 2.1.1

edited Feb 02 '17 at 04:05

Francisco Presencia

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answered Mar 20 '14 at 05:59

Arnel Bucio

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+1 on Ubuntu this gives version ```1.9.7``` as opposed to ```1.4.0```. – opyate Apr 29 '14 at 08:49
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+1 for using `npm` but see [my answer](http://stackoverflow.com/a/25953078/881743) – Fery W Sep 20 '14 at 20:39
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If bitbucket.org is blocked by your proxy `npm install phantomjs --phantomjs_cdnurl=http://cnpmjs.org/downloads` – 79E09796 Nov 26 '15 at 17:38
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On Ubuntu 14.04, this now gives me `2.1.1`. – Joe Mornin Apr 02 '16 at 17:42
On ubuntu 18.04 I get an error, that I should run it as root. With `sudo` it works: `sudo npm install -g phantomjs-prebuilt` – rubo77 Jul 24 '18 at 17:04

score 58 · Answer 3 · edited Feb 06 '14 at 22:52

58

download from phantomjs website the prebuilt package : http://phantomjs.org/download.html then open a terminal and go to the Downloads folder

sudo mv phantomjs-1.8.1-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2 /usr/local/share/.
cd /usr/local/share/
sudo tar xjf phantomjs-1.8.1-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2
sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs-1.8.1-linux-x86_64 /usr/local/share/phantomjs
sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs/bin/phantomjs /usr/local/bin/phantomjs

then to check install phantomjs -v should return 1.8.1

edited Feb 06 '14 at 22:52

Ponkadoodle

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answered Jan 10 '13 at 13:03

Guidouil

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Why do you create a link instead of copy paste directly? – Heisenberg Nov 02 '13 at 05:29
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Why would you copy paste directly when you can symlink? =/ – jmar Apr 23 '14 at 17:39
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on a fresh ubuntu also apt-get install libfontconfig – Ryan Detzel Sep 05 '14 at 15:51
I had phantomjs installed in my user directory. Selenium didn't work with that. I then moved phantomjs to `/usr/local/share` and created these symbolic links. Then it worked (even though file permissions were the same). Can anyone explain to this non-linux-expert why this made a difference? – Peter May 17 '17 at 09:44

score 38 · Answer 4 · 2017-09-29T17:53:22.047

38

Install from package manager:

sudo apt-get install phantomjs

edited Sep 29 '17 at 17:53

answered Dec 27 '12 at 21:48

2

Sadly, this now installs 1.4, which is so old many things that use phantom.js just won't work. – Julian Birch Jul 29 '13 at 12:38
@JulianBirch Yes, I think if you have in Ubuntu Saucy Salamander(13.10) you can get the 1.9.0 version according to this [link] https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/phantomjs, I just installed from Raring Ringtail(13.04) and I get 1.6.0 version,like it also say in the link – Jul 30 '13 at 01:02
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Installed 1.9.0 on Ubuntu 14.04 – Ionică Bizău Jun 19 '14 at 16:06
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But I recommend to install it via [`npm install -g phantomjs`](http://stackoverflow.com/a/22524611/1420197). – Ionică Bizău Jun 19 '14 at 16:18
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Just installed. It's 1.9.0 now. – Strabek Nov 15 '15 at 18:15

score 14 · Answer 5 · edited Nov 12 '16 at 01:24

14

Here are the build steps I used (note these instructions are for version 1.3. See comments to this answer for the installation instructions of the latest PhantomJS):

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install git-core
sudo apt-get install build-essential
sudo apt-get install libqt4-dev libqtwebkit-dev qt4-qmake
git clone git://github.com/ariya/phantomjs.git && cd phantomjs
git checkout 1.3
qmake-qt4 && make

Now install Xvfb

sudo apt-get install xvfb xfonts-100dpi xfonts-75dpi xfonts-scalable xfonts-cyrillic

Launch Xvfb:
Xvfb :23 -screen 0 1024x768x24 &

Now run phantom:
DISPLAY=:23 ./phantomjs hello.js

edited Nov 12 '16 at 01:24

Rao

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answered Feb 12 '12 at 03:49

Vijay Boyapati

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These instructions are now obsolete, in the current version (1.5) there is no need to install either qt or xfvb. See http://code.google.com/p/phantomjs/wiki/Installation – michelpm Jun 04 '12 at 21:21
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Michel is correct, the latest version of phantom should be used because it doesn't require a virtual display (Xvfb) – Vijay Boyapati Sep 28 '12 at 18:27
Answer from Andre was quicker and easier for me. – fooMonster Apr 23 '13 at 18:04

score 12 · Answer 6 · edited Nov 02 '12 at 09:26

12

For PhantomJS version above 1.5, consider this (verbatim copy of the build instructions on the phantom website):

For Ubuntu Linux (tested on a barebone install of Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx and Ubuntu 11.04 Natty Narwhal):
sudo apt-get install build-essential chrpath git-core libssl-dev libfontconfig1-dev
git clone git://github.com/ariya/phantomjs.git
cd phantomjs
git checkout 1.7
./build.sh

edited Nov 02 '12 at 09:26

iwein

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answered Sep 28 '12 at 06:04

nbk

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I think it should be noted (as it is on PhantomJS website) that building from source can take a **very long** time (hours on a small machine). – Whymarrh Feb 20 '14 at 07:05
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It should also be noted that this answer resolved the issue I had with phantomjs when using the prebuilt binaries failed. It took around 1 hour to compile on 2gb ubuntu 10.04 dual core virtual. – Keith John Hutchison May 01 '15 at 22:43

iwein · Answer 7 · 2013-03-10T20:05:07.517

For Ubuntu you can use the prebuilt versions downloadable from the PhantomJS site.

If you have some serious time on your hands you can also build it yourself. (This is exactly the procedure from Nikhil's answer).

The guys over at PhantomJS recommend using the binaries to save time:

Warning: Compiling PhantomJS from source takes a long time, mainly due to thousands of files in the WebKit module. With 4 parallel compile jobs on a modern machine, the entire process takes roughly 30 minutes. It is highly recommended to download and install the ready-made binary package if it is available.

With a modern machine they mean > 4 cores, > 8gb mem I think. I tried it on a micro AWS instance and gave up after 2 hours.

In short: install the prebuilt packages from the PhantomJS site per their instructions.

rev · Answer 8 · 2014-12-29T21:23:47.213

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in my vagrant bootstrap:

apt-get install -y build-essential chrpath git-core libssl-dev libfontconfig1-dev
git clone git://github.com/ariya/phantomjs.git
cd phantomjs
git checkout 1.9
echo y | ./build.sh
ln -s /home/vagrant/phantomjs/bin/phantomjs /usr/local/bin/phantomjs
cd ..

edited Dec 29 '14 at 21:23

answered Jan 19 '14 at 19:53

rev

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@artjom b: this would be better as a comment than an edit. "You don't have to forget to put the resulting executable from ./build.sh into a directory that is in the PATH environment variable. This can be done via symlink as in this example." – rev Dec 29 '14 at 21:23
You don't have to forget to put the resulting executable from `./build.sh` into a directory that is in the PATH environment variable. This can be done via symlink as in this example. – Artjom B. Dec 29 '14 at 21:27
That's what all the other answers forget when using `build.sh`. I only wanted to improve your answer by making that fact more visible. If you don't want it there, fine. – Artjom B. Dec 29 '14 at 21:32

score 4 · Answer 9 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:10

4

Personaly I prefer using npm (see Arnel Bucio answer)

sudo npm install -g phantomjs

but! I noticed that some of npm module still can't see it as global executable.

enter image description here

so!

Create new /usr/share/phantomjs/ directory link

cd /usr/share
sudo ln -s ../lib/node_modules/phantomjs/lib/phantom phantomjs

Remove old /usr/bin/phantomjs executable link and create the new one

cd /usr/bin
sudo mv phantomjs phantomjs.old
sudo ln -s ../share/phantomjs .

edited May 23 '17 at 12:10

Community

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answered Sep 20 '14 at 20:37

Fery W

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Doing the commands after broke it for me on Ubuntu 14.04. Works with just the `npm` install, and `sudo apt-get install libfontconfig` after. – Tarang Oct 19 '14 at 07:17

score 2 · Answer 10 · answered Jun 10 '13 at 15:44

2

I have done with this.

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install build-essential chrpath git-core libssl-dev libfontconfig1-dev
git clone git://github.com/ariya/phantomjs.git
cd phantomjs
git checkout 1.9
./build.sh

answered Jun 10 '13 at 15:44

Amar Banerjee

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score 2 · Answer 11 · answered Sep 01 '16 at 09:38

2

See link Installation guide is in ...

https://gist.github.com/julionc/7476620

And run in terminal with this command

phantomjs --webdriver=4444

answered Sep 01 '16 at 09:38

Yasar Arafath

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score 1 · Answer 12 · answered Mar 18 '13 at 08:06

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From the official site: phantomjs site

sudo apt-get install build-essential chrpath git-core libssl-dev libfontconfig1-dev
git clone git://github.com/ariya/phantomjs.git
cd phantomjs
git checkout 1.8
./build.sh

answered Mar 18 '13 at 08:06

Ihor Shubin

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score 1 · Answer 13 · answered Sep 01 '13 at 19:25

For Ubuntu, download the suitable file from http://phantomjs.org/download.html. CD to the downloaded folder. Then:

sudo tar xvf phantomjs-1.9.0-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2
sudo mv phantomjs-1.9.0-linux-x86_64 /usr/local/share/phantomjs
sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs/bin/phantomjs /usr/bin/phantomjs

Make sure to replace the file name in these commands with the file you have downloaded.

score 1 · Answer 14 · answered Jan 05 '14 at 20:00

1

Be aware this is definitely one way to do it:

$ sudo apt-get install phantomjs
$ phantomjs -v
1.6.0

Sadly, it installs 1.6 and not the latest one, but this works for my purposes.

answered Jan 05 '14 at 20:00

Starkers

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This installs version `1.9.0-1` now – Sean Apr 22 '15 at 00:29

score 1 · Answer 15 · answered Jul 29 '16 at 19:41

1

I know this is too old, but, just i case someone gets to this question from Google now, you can install it by typing apt-get install phantomjs

answered Jul 29 '16 at 19:41

Nico Savini

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It installs X11 – eozzy Sep 11 '16 at 19:07

score 1 · Answer 16 · answered Jan 17 '17 at 18:16

On Ubuntu for Windows, I found neither apt-get nor npm versions worked for me. What worked was the script from this comment.

For ease of use, I pasted the whole thing into a script file called install_phantomjs.sh, made it executable (chmod u+x install_phantomjs.sh), and then ran it (./install_phantomjs.sh)

score 0 · Answer 17 · edited Nov 20 '14 at 19:10

Or the latest - 32bit version Linux

sudo wget http://phantomjs.googlecode.com/files/phantomjs-1.9.2-linux-i686.tar.bz2

sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs-1.9.2-linux-i686/bin/phantomjs /usr/local/share/phantomjs

sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs-1.9.2-linux-i686/bin/phantomjs /usr/local/bin/phantomjs

sudo ln -s /usr/local/share/phantomjs-1.9.2-linux-i686/bin/phantomjs /usr/bin/phantomjs

score 0 · Answer 18 · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

0

Installation and Calling Phantomjs

Follow the steps doesn't work, but cloned from others built. (ver2.0)

edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

Community

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answered Aug 15 '15 at 23:10

Rγσ ξηg Lιαη Ημ 雷欧

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score 0 · Answer 19 · answered Sep 18 '15 at 07:54

Bellow the installation procedure by Julio Napurí https://gist.github.com/julionc

Version: 1.9.8

Platform: x86_64

First, install or update to the latest system software.

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install build-essential chrpath libssl-dev libxft-dev

Install these packages needed by PhantomJS to work correctly.

sudo apt-get install libfreetype6 libfreetype6-dev
sudo apt-get install libfontconfig1 libfontconfig1-dev

Get it from the PhantomJS website.

cd ~
export PHANTOM_JS="phantomjs-1.9.8-linux-x86_64"
wget https://bitbucket.org/ariya/phantomjs/downloads/$PHANTOM_JS.tar.bz2
sudo tar xvjf $PHANTOM_JS.tar.bz2

Once downloaded, move Phantomjs folder to /usr/local/share/ and create a symlink:

sudo mv $PHANTOM_JS /usr/local/share
sudo ln -sf /usr/local/share/$PHANTOM_JS/bin/phantomjs /usr/local/bin

Now, It should have PhantomJS properly on your system.

phantomjs --version

score 0 · Answer 20 · answered Dec 08 '15 at 15:51

I have found this simpler way - Phantom dependencies + Npm

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install build-essential chrpath libssl-dev libxft-dev
sudo apt-get install libfreetype6 libfreetype6-dev
sudo apt-get install libfontconfig1 libfontconfig1-dev

and npm

[sudo] npm install -g phantomjs

Done.

score 0 · Answer 21 · answered Jan 12 '16 at 20:17

0

On linux to run hello.js don't forget to add the path of hello.js:

phantomjs YourPathToPhantomjsFolder/examples/hello.js

answered Jan 12 '16 at 20:17

Mr Rubix

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score 0 · Answer 22 · answered Mar 22 '16 at 06:48

0

If you want to use phantomjs easily, you can use it at phantomjscloud.com You can get the result just by http request.

answered Mar 22 '16 at 06:48

Shin Kim

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This wasn't what the OP asked for at all. – Sujal Mandal May 26 '16 at 16:24
Thank you for your comment. It was my fault – Shin Kim Jan 27 '17 at 16:54

score 0 · Answer 23 · answered May 02 '17 at 09:47

This is how I place a specific version of phantomjs in /usr/local/bin on my docker containers.

curl -Ls https://github.com/Medium/phantomjs/releases/download/v1.9.19/phantomjs-1.9.8-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2 \
    | tar jxvf - --strip-components=2 -C /usr/local/bin/ ./phantomjs-1.9.8-linux-x86_64/bin/phantomjs

or with out ./ depending on OS.

curl -Ls https://github.com/Medium/phantomjs/releases/download/v1.9.19/phantomjs-1.9.8-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2 \
    | tar jxvf - --strip-components=2 -C /usr/local/bin/ phantomjs-1.9.8-linux-x86_64/bin/phantomjs

HarlemSquirrel · Answer 24 · 2017-06-13T15:43:38.830

You can get up and running without sudo or npm. Simply download, extract, and add to path.

This has the added advantage of easy backup if you are in the habit of backing up your entire home folder which I highly recommend. This also works with any version of Linux.

➤  cd ~
➤  wget https://bitbucket.org/ariya/phantomjs/downloads/phantomjs-2.1.1-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2
➤  mkdir phantomjs
➤  tar xjf phantomjs-2.1.1-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2 -C phantomjs
➤  echo 'export PATH="$PATH:$HOME/phantomjs/bin"' >> .profile
➤  source .profile
➤  phantomjs -v
2.1.1

The disadvantages are:

You will need to manually upgrade
Other users will not have access to this.

You could use a very simple shell script for installing/upgrading

#!/bin/sh
# install_phantomjs.sh $VERSION

$VERSION = $1
printf "Downloading PhantomJS $VERSION...\n"
wget "https://bitbucket.org/ariya/phantomjs/downloads/phantomjs-$VERSION-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2"

printf "Extracting PhantomJS $VERSION to ~/phantomjs...\n"
mkdir ~/phantomjs
tar xjf phantomjs-$VERSION-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2 -C ~/phantomjs

printf "Done! Make sure $HOME/phantomjs/bin is in your path.\n"

Or in a Dockerfile

# Download and setup PhantomJS
ENV PHANTOMJS_VERSION 2.1.1
RUN curl -fSL "https://bitbucket.org/ariya/phantomjs/downloads/phantomjs-$PHANTOMJS_VERSION-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2" -o /tmp/phantomjs.tar.bz2 && \
  mkdir ~/phantomjs && \
  tar xjf /tmp/phantomjs.tar.bz2 -C ~/phantomjs && \
  rm /tmp/phantomjs.tar.bz2
ENV PATH /home/$USERNAME/phantomjs/bin:$PATH

score 0 · Answer 25 · answered Mar 29 '18 at 18:52

Here is what I did on my ubuntu 16.04 machine

sudo apt-get update
sudo wget https://bitbucket.org/ariya/phantomjs/downloads/phantomjs-2.1.1-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2
sudo mv path/where/you/downloaded/phantomjs  /usr/bin

and finally when I do

phantomjs -v

I get 2.1.1

After going through every answer of this thread. I think this is the best solution for installing and running phantomjs in ubuntu.

How can I set up & run PhantomJS on Ubuntu?

25 Answers25

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