diff --git a/src/crawler.ts b/src/crawler.ts
index 6a6c2698..abddbbbc 100644
--- a/src/crawler.ts
+++ b/src/crawler.ts
@@ -56,7 +56,7 @@ import { SitemapReader } from "./util/sitemapper.js";
 import { ScopedSeed } from "./util/seeds.js";
 import { WARCWriter, createWARCInfo, setWARCInfo } from "./util/warcwriter.js";
 import { isHTMLContentType } from "./util/reqresp.js";
-import { initDispatcher } from "./util/proxy.js";
+import { initProxy } from "./util/proxy.js";
 
 const behaviors = fs.readFileSync(
   new URL(
@@ -171,6 +171,8 @@ export class Crawler {
   maxHeapUsed = 0;
   maxHeapTotal = 0;
 
+  proxyServer?: string;
+
   driver!: (opts: {
     page: Page;
     data: PageState;
@@ -437,7 +439,7 @@ export class Crawler {
   async bootstrap() {
     const subprocesses: ChildProcess[] = [];
 
-    await initDispatcher();
+    this.proxyServer = initProxy(this.params.proxyServer);
 
     subprocesses.push(this.launchRedis());
 
@@ -1292,7 +1294,7 @@ self.__bx_behaviors.selectMainBehavior();
       emulateDevice: this.emulateDevice,
       swOpt: this.params.serviceWorker,
       chromeOptions: {
-        proxy: this.params.proxyServer,
+        proxy: this.proxyServer,
         userAgent: this.emulateDevice.userAgent,
         extraArgs: this.extraChromeArgs(),
       },
diff --git a/src/util/browser.ts b/src/util/browser.ts
index e72f9a7d..73a74222 100644
--- a/src/util/browser.ts
+++ b/src/util/browser.ts
@@ -20,7 +20,6 @@ import puppeteer, {
 } from "puppeteer-core";
 import { CDPSession, Target, Browser as PptrBrowser } from "puppeteer-core";
 import { Recorder } from "./recorder.js";
-import { getProxy } from "./proxy.js";
 
 type BtrixChromeOpts = {
   proxy?: string;
@@ -236,7 +235,6 @@ export class Browser {
       ...extraArgs,
     ];
 
-    proxy = proxy || getProxy();
     if (proxy) {
       logger.info("Using proxy", { proxy }, "browser");
     }
diff --git a/src/util/proxy.ts b/src/util/proxy.ts
index 57c3fa18..c7fe2a85 100644
--- a/src/util/proxy.ts
+++ b/src/util/proxy.ts
@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@ import { Dispatcher, ProxyAgent, setGlobalDispatcher } from "undici";
 import { socksDispatcher } from "fetch-socks";
 import type { SocksProxyType } from "socks/typings/common/constants.js";
 
-export function getProxy() {
+export function getEnvProxyUrl() {
   if (process.env.PROXY_SERVER) {
     return process.env.PROXY_SERVER;
   }
@@ -16,15 +16,21 @@ export function getProxy() {
   return "";
 }
 
-export function initDispatcher() {
-  const dispatcher = createDispatcher();
-  if (dispatcher) {
-    setGlobalDispatcher(dispatcher);
+export function initProxy(proxy?: string): string {
+  if (!proxy) {
+    proxy = getEnvProxyUrl();
   }
+  if (proxy) {
+    const dispatcher = createDispatcher(proxy);
+    if (dispatcher) {
+      setGlobalDispatcher(dispatcher);
+      return proxy;
+    }
+  }
+  return "";
 }
 
-export function createDispatcher(): Dispatcher | undefined {
-  const proxyUrl = getProxy();
+export function createDispatcher(proxyUrl: string): Dispatcher | undefined {
   if (proxyUrl.startsWith("http://") || proxyUrl.startsWith("https://")) {
     // HTTP PROXY does not support auth, as it's not supported in the browser
     // so must drop username/password for consistency
diff --git a/tests/proxy.test.js b/tests/proxy.test.js
index b2bdad96..49326bf8 100644
--- a/tests/proxy.test.js
+++ b/tests/proxy.test.js
@@ -94,7 +94,7 @@ test("http proxy, PDF, separate env vars", () => {
   }
 });
 
-test("http proxy, error, not running, separate env vars", () => {
+test("http proxy set, but not running, separate env vars", () => {
   let status = 0;
 
   try {
@@ -105,4 +105,15 @@ test("http proxy, error, not running, separate env vars", () => {
   expect(status).toBe(1);
 });
 
+test("http proxy set, but not running, cli arg", () => {
+  let status = 0;
+
+  try {
+    child_process.execSync(`docker run --rm webrecorder/browsertrix-crawler crawl --proxyServer http://host.docker.internal:${++globalPort} --url ${PDF} ${extraArgs}`, {encoding: "utf-8"});
+  } catch (e) {
+    status = e.status;
+  }
+  expect(status).toBe(1);
+});
+