diff --git a/js/src/config.ts b/js/src/config.ts
index a533892..a771601 100644
--- a/js/src/config.ts
+++ b/js/src/config.ts
@@ -1,7 +1,9 @@
 import { ChaCha20Poly1305 } from '@stablelib/chacha20poly1305'
-import { subtle } from 'crypto'
 import { AlgorithmConfig, EncryptionAlgorithm } from './types'
 import { bitsToUint8Array, bitsToUintArray, toUint8Array, toUintArray, uint8ArrayToBits, uintArrayToBits } from './utils'
+import { webcrypto } from './webcrypto'
+
+const { subtle } = webcrypto
 
 // commit hash for this repo
 export const GIT_COMMIT_HASH = 'c9df4f9eef53566536a0afec5444b9544630fa0c'
diff --git a/js/src/webcrypto.ts b/js/src/webcrypto.ts
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..bb87062
--- /dev/null
+++ b/js/src/webcrypto.ts
@@ -0,0 +1,14 @@
+export const webcrypto = (() => {
+	// if we're in node, we need to use
+	// webcrypto provided by the crypto module
+	if(typeof window !== 'undefined') {
+		return window.crypto
+	}
+
+	if(typeof self !== 'undefined' && self.crypto) {
+		return self.crypto
+	}
+
+	const { webcrypto } = require('crypto')
+	return webcrypto as Crypto
+})()
\ No newline at end of file