## TL;DR
Save the browser context's storage state (cookies plus local storage) to a file after login and refresh it periodically. When the context crashes, launch a fresh one and load that file instead of logging in again. Re-login on every crash is slow and can trip the site's security; restoring state is instant.

```text
playwright browser context crashed mid-scrape and agent lost session state
```

## Use this when
- a Playwright crash drops you back to logged-out
- session cookies vanish mid-scrape
- the agent re-logs-in after every restart

## Not for this skill when
- selectors break because the page changed (fix the selectors)
- the site needs a proxy or VPN to load at all
- Playwright itself will not install or launch

## Steps
1. After a successful login, save the storage state to auth.json. Verify: the file exists and contains cookies for the target domain.
2. Re-save the state every 10 minutes during long runs so it stays fresh. Verify: the file timestamp updates during the run.
3. Wrap the scrape loop in a crash handler: on context crash, close the old context and create a new one loading auth.json. Verify: the new context loads a logged-in page with no login step.
4. Validate the session before resuming: load one known logged-in page and check for a logged-in marker. Verify: if the marker is missing, re-login once and re-save.
5. Keep the crashed context's page and queue position in your checkpoint so the new context resumes where it stopped. Verify: no URL is scraped twice after recovery.

### Tool/version compatibility
Playwright for Python or Node, any recent version. The storage state API is stable across both.

## Why it happens
Session state lives inside the browser context object. When the process dies, the object dies with it, and nothing was ever written to disk.

## Edge cases / pitfalls
- Some sites bind sessions to IP or fingerprint; restored state may still fail behind a new proxy.
- Never commit auth.json to a repo; keep it in a secrets location with tight permissions.
- Expired sessions look like crashes; validate before assuming the state file is bad.

## Variant phrasings
### Playwright crashed and the scraper had to log in again
Short version: session state lost on context crash.
### Browser died mid-run and cookies were gone
Short version: no persisted storage state.

## Provenance

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_yV1G0PhDVrYtT_avV9aEfw