Maxim Salnikov

Privacy-first in-browser Generative AI web apps: offline-ready, future-proof, standards-based

What if you could run powerful AI in a web app with total user privacy, completely offline? New browser APIs make it possible.

Privacy-first in-browser Generative AI web apps: offline-ready, future-proof, standards-based
#1about 3 minutes

A demo of client-side AI using the NPU

A computer vision application performs image classification directly in the browser without any backend calls by leveraging the device's Neural Processing Unit (NPU).

#2about 3 minutes

The case for privacy-first, on-device AI

On-device AI meets user demands for performance, privacy, and offline access while satisfying developer needs for a unified codebase and helpful abstractions.

#3about 3 minutes

Introducing the Web Neural Network (WebNN) standard

The emerging WebNN standard provides a model-agnostic, unified abstraction for near-native AI execution in the browser, designed around practical use cases.

#4about 4 minutes

Leveraging hardware like the CPU, GPU, and NPU

WebNN can access all available hardware, with the NPU offering a power-efficient alternative to the GPU for sustained AI workloads on mobile devices.

#5about 6 minutes

Getting started with the low-level WebNN API

To experiment with the emerging WebNN standard, developers must use canary browser versions and enable specific flags, but its low-level API can be complex.

#6about 7 minutes

Simplifying development with high-level AI frameworks

Frameworks like ONNX Runtime Web and Transformers.js provide higher-level, task-based abstractions over WebNN, making it easier for app developers to build AI features.

#7about 3 minutes

Best practices and the future of browser AI

Focus on user experience by providing fallbacks and progress indicators, and look ahead to upcoming built-in browser APIs like the Prompt API that abstract away model management.

#8about 2 minutes

Demo code and using web workers for performance

The demo applications are built as offline-ready Progressive Web Apps and use Web Workers to run intensive AI computations without freezing the main UI thread.

Related jobs
Jobs that call for the skills explored in this talk.

Featured Partners

From learning to earning

Jobs that call for the skills explored in this talk.