recit

Record it. Agents see it.

Free, open-source screen recording CLI + MCP server for AI agents. Zero cost. 100% local. No cloud. No API keys.

Features

• Screen Recording — Capture full screen, windows, or regions via ffmpeg
• Screenshots — Instant PNG capture with JSON metadata output
• MCP Server — 5 tools exposed via Model Context Protocol (stdio)
• Frame Extraction — Scene-detection key frames for vision model analysis
• Event Logging — JSONL event log synced to video clock (clicks, keystrokes, annotations)
• Cross-Platform — macOS, Windows, Linux
• $0 Cost — No APIs, no cloud, no hosting, no subscriptions

Quick Start

# For Claude Code
claude mcp add recit -- npx -y @recit/mcp

# For Cursor / VS Code — add to mcp.json:
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "recit": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@recit/mcp"]
    }
  }
}

# Prerequisites (both free)
brew install ffmpeg       # macOS
sudo apt install ffmpeg   # Ubuntu/Debian
winget install ffmpeg     # Windows

CLI Usage

# Start recording
recit start [--output path] [--fps 15] [--json]

# Stop recording
recit stop <id> [--json]

# Capture screenshot
recit snap [--output path] [--json]

# Extract frames from video
recit frames <video> [--max 20] [--output dir]

# Check recording status
recit status [id]

# Start MCP server
recit mcp

MCP Tools

Tool	Description
recit_start	Start screen recording
recit_stop	Stop recording, get file path
recit_snap	Capture screenshot
recit_frames	Extract key frames from video
recit_status	Get recording status or active count

Architecture

AI Agent (Claude/Codex/Cursor)
    │
    │ stdio (stdin/stdout)
    ▼
recit MCP Server (Node.js, local)
    │
    │ child_process
    ▼
ffmpeg (free, local)
    │
    ▼
.mp4 / .png saved to user's disk

$0 spent. Nothing uploaded. Everything local.

Development

git clone https://github.com/recit-ai/recit.git
cd recit
npm install
npm test        # Run 43 tests
npm run build   # Build TypeScript

Tech Stack

Layer	Tool	Cost
Recording	ffmpeg	$0
Agent Integration	MCP SDK (stdio)	$0
Distribution	npm	$0
Code Hosting	GitHub	$0
Runtime	Node.js	$0
Testing	Vitest	$0

License

Apache 2.0