byob

Bring Your Own Browser — let your AI assistant use the Chrome you already have open.

English · 中文

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byob is a local MCP server that lets AI coding tools (Claude Code, Cursor, Cline, Windsurf, etc.) directly control your real Chrome — the one where you're already logged into everything.

"read my Twitter timeline and summarize the top 5 posts"
"google 'mcp protocol spec', click the first result, read the page"
"take a screenshot of example.com"
"grab my GitHub session cookie so I can curl with it"
"open my Gmail tab and tell me how many unread"
"fill in this form with my details and submit it"

	WebFetch	Headless Puppeteer	byob
Sees logged-in pages	❌	⚠️ manual cookie copy	✅ already logged in
Passes bot detection	❌	❌	✅ real human browser
Setup time	0	hours	~5 min
Cloud cost	free	$$	free

Compared with tools that attach over Chrome's remote-debugging port (DevTools MCP, agent-browser, Playwright --cdp): byob is an extension, so there's no debugging port to open, no "Allow remote debugging?" prompt on every connection, and nothing else on your machine can hijack your logged-in browser through it.

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Install

Quick install (recommended)

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wxtsky/byob/main/install.sh | bash

On Windows, run the same command from Git Bash or MSYS2. The script checks prerequisites (Node.js ≥ 20, bun, Chrome/Edge/Brave), clones the repo, builds everything, and walks you through MCP registration interactively. If bun is not installed, it offers to install it for you using the native installer for your OS.

Set BYOB_INSTALL_DIR to change the install location (default: ~/byob). Advanced: BYOB_REPO, BYOB_REF, and BYOB_SKIP_SETUP=1 are supported for forks, pinned refs, and CI-style dependency install only.

Manual install

Prefer to do it yourself?

Requires Node.js ≥ 20, bun, Chrome, and any MCP-compatible AI tool.

git clone https://github.com/wxtsky/byob
cd byob
bun install
bun run setup

bun run setup walks through the install interactively:

1. Pick output language (English / 中文)
2. Generates a unique extension key for you
3. Builds the Chrome extension
4. Writes the config that lets Chrome talk to byob
5. Prompts you to multi-select your AI tools. Claude Code gets the bundled plugin (Skill + auto-started MCP); other clients get their MCP config.

After the script finishes, three manual steps remain:

Step 2 — Load extension in Chrome

Open chrome://extensions in Chrome.

1. Top-right → turn ON Developer mode
2. Top-left → click Load unpacked
3. Select the folder printed in your terminal, something like:

   /your/path/to/byob/packages/extension/output/chrome-mv3
   

Step 3 — Restart Chrome

Quit Chrome completely (⌘Q on Mac / close all windows on Windows), then reopen.

Closing a single tab or window is not sufficient — Chrome only reads the Native Messaging config at startup.

Step 4 — Claude Code plugin / manual MCP reference

The setup script registers your selected tools automatically. The block below is for reference only — use it if you skipped the prompt or want to register a different tool later:

Claude Code plugin (recommended)

claude plugin marketplace add wxtsky/byob
claude plugin install byob@byob --scope user