English Français العربية

Hostbeam

Official registry Developer tools

Lets a coding agent read the screenshots you beam to its server with Hostbeam.

Source code Website Documentation

What can you do with Hostbeam?

  • latest_screenshot returns the most recent beam as images, with how long
  • list_screenshots lists recent beams with file names, sizes and times. No
  • read_screenshot returns one file by name.

Install

Add this to your client's MCP configuration (Claude Desktop: claude_desktop_config.json; Cursor: .cursor/mcp.json; VS Code and others use the same "mcpServers" shape).

NPM package @hostbeam/mcp
Claude Code 
claude mcp add hostbeam -e 'HOSTBEAM_DIR=/tmp/hostbeam' -- npx -y @hostbeam/mcp@0.1.4
JSON configuration (Claude Desktop, Cursor, VS Code) 
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "hostbeam": {
            "command": "npx",
            "args": [
                "-y",
                "@hostbeam/mcp@0.1.4"
            ],
            "env": {
                "HOSTBEAM_DIR": "/tmp/hostbeam"
            }
        }
    }
}

Environment variables

  • HOSTBEAM_DIR The folder Hostbeam beams to on this server. Leave unset for /tmp/hostbeam.

Documentation

From the project's README on GitHub, refreshed weekly. Links open on GitHub.

Contents
  1. Hostbeam MCP server
  2. Install
  3. Tools
  4. What it reads
  5. Check it by hand
  6. License

Hostbeam MCP server

Hostbeam sends a screenshot from your Mac or your iPhone to a server over SSH and puts the remote path on your clipboard, so you can paste it to a coding agent running there.

This MCP server runs on that server, next to the agent. The agent can ask for the screenshot you just beamed and read it, without you pasting the path.

Install

On the server your agent runs on, not on your Mac or your phone. Node 18 or later.

For Claude Code:

claude mcp add -s user hostbeam -- npx -y @hostbeam/mcp

-s user makes it available in every project on that server.

For Codex:

codex mcp add hostbeam -- npx -y @hostbeam/mcp

For other MCP clients, in their JSON config:

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

If the server can't reach npm, copy hostbeam-mcp.mjs to it and run that instead. It has no dependencies.

claude mcp add -s user hostbeam -- node /path/to/hostbeam-mcp.mjs

Hostbeam beams to /tmp/hostbeam unless you changed the folder for that host. If you did, give the server the same folder: -e HOSTBEAM_DIR=/your/folder for Claude Code, --env HOSTBEAM_DIR=/your/folder for Codex, or "env": { "HOSTBEAM_DIR": "/your/folder" } in JSON.

Tools

  • latest_screenshot returns the most recent beam as images, with how long ago it arrived. If you beamed several files at once, it returns all of them, up to six, and names the rest.
  • list_screenshots lists recent beams with file names, sizes and times. No image data.
  • read_screenshot returns one file by name.

What it reads

Only files Hostbeam delivered: names starting with hostbeam- with an image extension, in that one folder. It doesn't look in subfolders, and it refuses a name with a path in it. It never writes, moves or deletes anything.

It skips symlinks, and it won't read a folder that belongs to another user or that any user can write to, because a file there may not be one you beamed.

JPEG, PNG, GIF and WebP come back as images, up to 3.75 MB each. Other formats and larger files come back as a path instead: models only accept those four formats, and model APIs refuse bigger images. When a beam holds several files, latest_screenshot includes images up to 7.5 MB in total and names the rest.

Check it by hand

It speaks newline-delimited JSON-RPC on stdin and stdout:

printf '%s\n' \
  '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"initialize","params":{}}' \
  '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":2,"method":"tools/call","params":{"name":"list_screenshots"}}' \
  | npx -y @hostbeam/mcp

License

MIT

Frequently asked questions

What is Hostbeam?

Lets a coding agent read the screenshots you beam to its server with Hostbeam.

How do I install Hostbeam?

It runs on your machine. In Claude Code: claude mcp add hostbeam -e 'HOSTBEAM_DIR=/tmp/hostbeam' -- npx -y @hostbeam/mcp@0.1.4. For other clients, paste the JSON configuration from this page into their MCP settings.

Does Hostbeam need an API key?

Its registry entry lists no required key or secret. Some features may still need an account with the service it connects to.

Is Hostbeam open source?

Yes. Its code is on GitHub under the MIT license.

Who maintains Hostbeam?

It is published by PunkAbeat. AI.tn lists it but does not maintain or endorse it.

From the official MCP Registry. Listing is not an endorsement: review a server's code and permissions before giving it access to your data.