# Lighthouse review (2026): is it any good? > Google's open-source audit of page speed, accessibility and SEO Checked Oct 23, 2026 ยท graded Oct 23, 2026 by ToolGPA. Lighthouse is an open-source tool from Google's Chrome team that audits a web page and reports on its performance, accessibility, best practices and SEO, with an explanation and fix for every failed check. It runs in the Chrome DevTools panel, from the command line, as a Node module for continuous integration, as a Chrome extension, and behind PageSpeed Insights. An experimental Agentic Browsing category checks how ready a site is for AI agents. - **Category:** Technical SEO & Site Audits - **Made by:** Google - **Website:** https://developer.chrome.com/docs/lighthouse/overview - **Runs on:** Web, Browser extension - **Who should skip it:** Too light for watching a whole site, as it audits one page per run. - **Facts last checked:** Oct 23, 2026 ## Pricing As of Oct 23, 2026, Lighthouse is free to use. - **Pricing model:** Free - **Free plan:** Free and open source under the Apache 2.0 license: run it in Chrome DevTools, the command line, a Node script, the Chrome extension or PageSpeed Insights. - **Free trial:** None listed. | Plan | Price | What you get | | --- | --- | --- | | Open source | $0 | Every audit category, HTML and JSON reports, the Lighthouse Viewer, stack packs and plugins. | Read from https://developer.chrome.com/docs/lighthouse/overview on Oct 23, 2026. Prices change, so confirm with Lighthouse before buying. ## Key features - **Four audit categories:** Scores performance, accessibility, best practices and SEO, and each failed audit links to a page on why it matters and how to fix it. - **Several ways to run it:** A Lighthouse panel in Chrome DevTools, an npm command-line tool, a Node module for CI systems, a Chrome extension, or PageSpeed Insights with nothing to install. - **Pages behind a login:** Audits any page, public or requiring authentication; the DevTools workflow can also test local sites. - **Agentic Browsing audits:** An experimental category checks llms.txt, WebMCP tool registration and accessibility for agents, shown as a pass ratio rather than a 0 to 100 score. - **Reports and sharing:** Save reports as HTML or JSON, open them in the Lighthouse Viewer, and share them as secret GitHub gists. - **Stack packs and plugins:** Stack packs give advice specific to the CMS or framework a site uses, and plugins let developers add their own audit categories. ## Good for - Web developers fixing speed and accessibility problems on a page - Teams adding automated page audits to continuous integration - Checking basic on-page SEO such as meta descriptions and canonicals ## Worth knowing - The command-line and Node workflows need Google Chrome and Node 22 or later installed. - Audits one page per run; Lighthouse CI or another tool is needed to watch for regressions across a site. - The Agentic Browsing category is experimental, needs Chrome 150 or later, and its WebMCP audits need an origin trial. - The Chrome extension cannot test local sites or pages behind a login; Google recommends DevTools instead. ## ToolGPA grades **GPA: 3.2 out of 4**, graded Oct 23, 2026. Lighthouse audits a page for performance, accessibility, best practices and SEO and explains how to fix each failed check, free and built into Chrome DevTools. But it audits one page per run, so watching a whole site needs Lighthouse CI or another tool, the command line needs Node 22 and Chrome, and the new Agentic Browsing checks are experimental. - **Value for money: A.** Free and open source under Apache 2.0, built into Chrome DevTools and also run from the command line, a Node module, a Chrome extension or PageSpeed Insights. - **Free plan and trial: A.** Every audit category, report format and plugin is free, with no account. - **Features: C.** Four audit categories with a fix for each failed check, pages behind a login, stack packs and plugins, plus an experimental check of readiness for AI agents. The gap the listing shows: one page per run, so regressions across a site need Lighthouse CI or another tool. - **Ease of use: B.** No rating on record. If you have Chrome, it's already in DevTools with nothing to install. The command-line and Node routes need Node 22 or later. - **Platforms and integrations: B.** Runs in Chrome DevTools, from the command line, as a Node module for CI, as a Chrome extension and through PageSpeed Insights, with reports shared as GitHub gists. These are ToolGPA's own grades. Graded from this listing, whose facts were read from Google's own pages on 23 October 2026. Not based on using the product, and shorter than our full reviews. ## Where it stands among technical SEO tools - Lighthouse's GPA of 3.2 is higher than 81 of the 83 other technical SEO tools we grade, and level with 2. - It stands best on free plan and trial (A, above 62 of 83) and worst on features (C, above 10). - Lighthouse has no paid plan. - On features, ease of use and platforms it scores 2.7 out of 4, and no tool on the category's chart scores higher without costing more. The category's chart of price against score: https://toolgpa.com/charts/technical-seo ## Keep it, or make your own? **Keep it.** Lighthouse is free, so making your own would save you nothing. And it is not the kind of software a weekend replaces. It is one of the better ones too: its GPA of 3.2 is higher than 81 of the 83 other technical SEO tools we grade. - You could not: Speed tests run from real browsers on a schedule. - You could not: A crawler that checks every page of a site. A judgement by ToolGPA from this listing, by rules that are the same for every tool. Nothing was built to test it. ## Works with Chrome DevTools, PageSpeed Insights, GitHub Gists, Lighthouse CI **Tags:** Page speed, Site audit, Open source ## Alternatives - [PageSpeed Insights](https://toolgpa.com/tools/pagespeed-insights): Free Google speed test with real-user Core Web Vitals and Lighthouse. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/lighthouse-vs-pagespeed-insights) - [Unlighthouse](https://toolgpa.com/tools/unlighthouse): Free open-source tool that runs Lighthouse on every page of a site. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/lighthouse-vs-unlighthouse) - [WebPageTest](https://toolgpa.com/tools/webpagetest): Page speed tests from real browsers in locations around the world. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/lighthouse-vs-webpagetest) - [GTmetrix](https://toolgpa.com/tools/gtmetrix): Page speed testing with Lighthouse reports, monitoring and an API. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/gtmetrix-vs-lighthouse) - [DebugBear](https://toolgpa.com/tools/debugbear): Page speed and Core Web Vitals monitoring with lab tests and RUM. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/debugbear-vs-lighthouse) ## Sources The prices, plans, platforms and features above were read from these pages on Oct 23, 2026: - https://developer.chrome.com/docs/lighthouse/overview - https://developer.chrome.com/docs/lighthouse/agentic-browsing/scoring - https://github.com/GoogleChrome/lighthouse Page: https://toolgpa.com/tools/lighthouse Listed by ToolGPA (toolgpa.com).