Peekaboo 🫣 - Mac automation that sees the screen and does the clicks.

-0078d7?logo=apple&logoColor=white&style=flat-square)

Peekaboo brings high-fidelity screen capture, AI analysis, and complete GUI automation to macOS. Version 3 adds native agent flows and multi-screen automation across the CLI and MCP server.

What you get

• Pixel-accurate captures (windows, screens, menu bar) with optional Retina 2x scaling.
• Natural-language agent that chains Peekaboo tools (see, click, type, scroll, hotkey, menu, window, app, dock, space).
• Action-first UI automation for routine clicks/scrolls, with background process-targeted input by default when a target is known.
• Direct accessibility tools for settable values and named actions (set-value, perform-action).
• Menu and menubar discovery with structured JSON; no clicks required.
• Multi-provider AI through Tachikoma, including hosted, local, and OpenAI-/Anthropic-compatible providers.
• Claude Fable 5 support with 1M context and a 128K output ceiling; saved temperature/max-token settings are shared by the app and CLI and clamped to each model's capabilities.
• MCP server for Codex, Claude Code, and Cursor plus a native CLI; the same tools in both.
• Warm daemon and Peekaboo.app Bridge hosts for permission-bound automation, with distinct lease-owned sockets and local fallback.
• Configurable, testable workflows with reproducible sessions and strict typing.
• Requires macOS Screen Recording + Accessibility permissions (see docs/permissions.md).

Install

• macOS app + CLI (Homebrew):

brew install steipete/tap/peekaboo

• MCP server (Node 22+, no global install needed):

npx -y @steipete/peekaboo

Quick start

# Capture full screen at Retina scale and save to Desktop
peekaboo image --mode screen --retina --path ~/Desktop/screen.png
Capture current UI state, then copy its snapshot and opaque element IDs exactly
peekaboo see --app Safari --json
SNAPSHOT="<snapshot-id>"
TEXTFIELDID="<text-field-id>"
BUTT
Click a button by label
peekaboo click --on "Reload this page" --snapshot "$SNAPSHOT"
Directly set a text field value when the accessibility value is settable
peekaboo set-value --on "$TEXTFIELDID" --value "hello" --snapshot "$SNAPSHOT"
Invoke a named accessibility action on an element
peekaboo perform-action --on "$BUTTON_ID" --action AXPress --snapshot "$SNAPSHOT"
Run a natural-language automation
peekaboo agent "Open Notes and create a TODO list with three items"
Run as an MCP server (Codex, Claude Code, Cursor)
npx -y @steipete/peekaboo
Minimal MCP client config snippet:
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "peekaboo": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@steipete/peekaboo"],
      "env": {
        "PEEKABOOAIPROVIDERS": "openai/gpt-5.5,anthropic/claude-opus-4-8"
      }
    }
  }
}

Shell completions

Peekaboo can generate shell-native completions directly from the same Commander metadata that powers CLI help and docs:

# Current shell (recommended)
eval "$(peekaboo completions $SHELL)"
Explicit shells
eval "$(peekaboo completions zsh)"
eval "$(peekaboo completions bash)"
peekaboo completions fish | source

For persistent setup and troubleshooting, see docs/commands/completions.md.

Background vs foreground input

click, type, press, hotkey, and paste default to background delivery when Peekaboo can resolve a target process from --app, --pid, --window-id, or snapshot metadata. Background delivery posts process-targeted input without making the target app frontmost, so scripts can interact with Safari, Notes, Terminal, etc. without stealing focus.

Use --foreground when the app only accepts input in its focused key window, when you need a real foreground mouse event, or when you are intentionally driving the current focus. Focus flags such as --space-switch and --bring-to-current-space also imply foreground delivery. Element/query clicks first use Accessibility actions; keyboard input, coordinate clicks, and synthetic click fallback require Event Synthesizing for the sending process. Run peekaboo permissions request-event-synthesizing if permissions status reports it missing.

# Background: target Safari without activating it
peekaboo click "Address and search bar" --app Safari
peekaboo type "github.com/openclaw/Peekaboo" --app Safari --return
Foreground: focus Safari first for apps/fields that reject background input
peekaboo click "Address and search bar" --app Safari --foreground
peekaboo type "github.com/openclaw/Peekaboo" --app Safari --return --foreground

| Command | Key flags / subcommands | What it does | | --- | --- | --- | | see | --app, --mode screen/window, --retina, --json | Capture and annotate UI, return snapshot + element IDs | | click | --on <id/query>, --snapshot, --wait-for, --coords, --foreground | Click by element ID, label, or coordinates | | type | --text, --clear, --profile, --delay, --foreground | Enter text with pacing options | | set-value | --on <id/query>, --value, --snapshot | Directly set a settable accessibility value | | perform-action | --on <id/query>, --action, --snapshot | Invoke a named accessibility action | | press | key names, --count, --delay, --hold, --foreground | Special keys and sequences | | hotkey | combos like cmd,shift,t, --foreground | Modifier combos (cmd/ctrl/alt/shift) | | paste | text/file/image payloads, --restore-delay-ms, --foreground | Paste with clipboard restore | | scroll | --on <id>, --direction up/down, --amount | Scroll views or elements | | swipe | --from/--to, --duration, --steps | Smooth gesture-style drags | | drag | --from/--to, modifiers, Dock/Trash targets | Drag-and-drop between elements/coords | | move | --to <id/coords>, --screen-index | Position the cursor without clicking | | window | list, move, resize, focus, set-bounds | Move/resize/focus windows and Spaces | | app | launch, quit, relaunch, switch, list | Launch, quit, relaunch, switch apps | | space | list, switch, move-window | List or switch macOS Spaces | | menu | list, list-all, click, click-extra | List/click app menus and extras | | menubar | list, click | Target status-bar items by name/index | | dock | launch, right-click, hide, show, list | Interact with Dock items | | dialog | list, click, input, file, dismiss | Drive system dialogs (open/save/etc.) | | image | --mode screen/window/menu, --retina, --analyze | Screenshot screen/window/menu bar (+analyze) | | list | apps, windows, screens, menubar, permissions | Enumerate apps, windows, screens, permissions | | tools | --verbose, --json, --no-sort | Inspect native Peekaboo tools | | completions | [shell] | Generate zsh/bash/fish completion scripts from Commander metadata | | config | init, show, add, login, models | Manage credentials/providers/settings | | permissions | status, grant, request-screen-recording, request-event-synthesizing | Check/grant required macOS permissions | | run | .peekaboo.json, --output, --no-fail-fast | Execute .peekaboo.json automation scripts | | sleep | --duration (ms) | Millisecond delays between steps | | clean | --all-snapshots, --older-than, --snapshot | Prune snapshots and caches | | agent | --model, --dry-run, --resume, --max-steps, audio | Natural-language multi-step automation | | mcp | serve (default) | Run Peekaboo as an MCP server |

Models and providers

Peekaboo's provider list changes with Tachikoma and the tested model catalog. See docs/providers.md for the current provider reference, including OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI/Grok, Google Gemini, MiniMax, Kimi, Ollama, LM Studio, and compatible custom endpoints.

Set providers via PEEKABOOAIPROVIDERS or peekaboo config add. Agent generation settings live under agent.temperature and agent.maxTokens in ~/.peekaboo/config.json; the macOS Settings UI reads and writes the same values.

Learn more

• Project direction: VISION.md
• Command reference: docs/commands/
• Platform support: docs/platform-support.md
• Architecture: docs/ARCHITECTURE.md
• Building from source: docs/building.md
• Testing guide: docs/testing/tools.md
• MCP setup: docs/commands/mcp.md
• Permissions: docs/permissions.md
• Ollama/local models: docs/ollama.md
• Agent chat loop: docs/agent-chat.md
• Service API reference: docs/service-api-reference.md

Community

• PeekabooWin — Windows-first rewrite of the Peekaboo automation loop (JavaScript + PowerShell) by @FelixKruger
• PeekabooX — Linux-first rewrite of the Peekaboo automation loop (Rust + Python) by @nordbyte

Development basics

• Requirements: see docs/platform-support.md. Node 22+ is only needed for the npm MCP wrapper and pnpm helper scripts.
• Install deps: pnpm install then pnpm run build:cli or pnpm run test:safe.
• Lint/format: pnpm run lint && pnpm run format.

License