Agents

For AI agents

Pick the route that fits your agent:

An agent spends seconds per turn, so turns matter more than milliseconds. looktap is built to save them:

• --ls on any action prints the screen once it has settled, so acting and looking take one turn instead of two:

  looktap tap @3 --ls
  looktap fill "Email" a@b.co --ls

• wait instead of guessing sleeps. After an action that loads data, --ls can return a loading skeleton, so wait for the text you expect.

• run batches steps you already know into one call and one process. It prints each step as $ <step>, stops at the first failure, and names it:

  looktap run 'tap General; wait About; tap About --ls'
  looktap run - < steps.txt          # one step per line, # for comments

• logs / crashes after a step that misbehaved. Each logs shows only what's new since the last one.
• ls --json for structured output: {screen, elements: [{ref, label, type, x, y, w, h, value}]}.
• shot --scale 0.5 costs a quarter of the image tokens when the agent needs to see the screen (layout, colours, images). Usually ls is enough and the PNG is never opened.
• Hints when the screen isn't what it seems. When a passcode or permission prompt covers the app, ls prints a hint rather than an empty list.

#Claude Code plugin

In Claude Code, run:

/plugin install looktap --marketplace lakpriya1s/looktap

• What it adds:
  • the looktap skill, which teaches Claude the look-act loop, how to pick targets, when to wait, when a screenshot is worth it, how to debug a crash, and the safety rules;
  • /looktap:setup, which gets the machine ready: it installs the CLI (asking first), runs looktap doctor and explains each fix, offers to boot a simulator or emulator, walks you through a real iPhone's one-time steps, and finishes with a working ls. Add ios, android or iphone to set up just that.
• What it doesn't install: Xcode, the Android SDK and the Apple ID sign-in are yours to do; /looktap:setup tells you exactly what's missing.
• What it costs: about 150 tokens per session for the skill's description, and about 4.5k tokens each time Claude loads the skill.
• Staying current: every push to this repo is a new plugin version. Claude Code doesn't auto-update third-party plugins unless you turn it on (/plugin → Marketplaces → looktap → Enable auto-update); otherwise run /plugin marketplace update looktap now and then.
• The CLI: the skill runs looktap commands. Install them with npm install -g @looktap/cli, or the skill falls back to npx @looktap/cli.
• No MCP server inside, on purpose: with a shell, the CLI and the skill do the same job with fewer tokens, and an MCP server would add its 16 tool definitions to every session. Add @looktap/mcp separately if you want it anyway.

#MCP server, for clients without a shell

Agents with a shell (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor's agent, …) are best served by the CLI and the skill above. For chat apps and other clients without a shell, such as Claude Desktop, looktap is also an MCP server, published as @looktap/mcp and listed in the MCP Registry as io.github.lakpriya1s/looktap. Nothing to install first:

{ "mcpServers": { "looktap": { "command": "npx", "args": ["-y", "@looktap/mcp"] } } }

If your client can't find npx (desktop apps start servers with a minimal PATH), install the CLI and let it write the config with absolute paths:

looktap mcp --config      # prints a ready-to-paste client config with absolute paths

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "looktap": {
      "command": "/path/to/node",
      "args": ["/path/to/looktap/bin/looktap.js", "mcp"],
      "env": { "PATH": "/path/to/node/bin:/path/to/Android/sdk/platform-tools:/usr/bin:/bin" }
    }
  }
}

• Where to paste it:
  • Claude Desktop: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
  • Cursor: ~/.cursor/mcp.json
  • Claude Code: claude mcp add looktap -- npx -y @looktap/mcp (no install needed: it runs the latest version from npm). Or the absolute paths: claude mcp add looktap -- <node> <looktap.js> mcp
• Why absolute paths: desktop apps start servers with a minimal PATH. looktap also finds adb in the Android SDK by itself.
• The tools:
  • ls, tap, tap_xy, long_press, fill, type, key, hide_keyboard, swipe, scroll_to, back and wait;
  • screenshot, which returns the image itself;
  • logs and crashes;
  • looktap, for any other command line, or several separated by ;.
• Actions return the settled screen unless ls: false.
• The device is remembered: name a platform (or device) once when both an iPhone and an Android are booted.
• Speed: the server keeps each device's helper connection open, so a warm ls takes a few milliseconds.

Why a CLI first? Any agent with a shell can use it with no configuration, and its output is already as small as it gets.

Generated from README.md. Edit it there.