Reverse API Engineer

Turn websites into APIs. Browse (or let an agent browse), and get a clean, typed client for the endpoints the site actually uses.

How it works

1. You give it a website and a goal ("fetch all Apple jobs").
2. A browser visits the site, either driven by you or by an AI agent.
3. Network traffic is captured to a HAR file.
4. Claude reads the traffic and writes you a working API client (Python, JS, or TS).

No more manually opening DevTools, copying cURL commands, and gluing together a client.

Install

uv tool install reverse-api-engineer   # or: pip install reverse-api-engineer
playwright install chromium

Quick start

reverse-api-engineer
> fetch all apple jobs from their careers page

# Browser opens. Navigate, interact, close when done.
# → ./scripts/apple_jobs_api/  (api_client.py, README.md, example_usage.py)

Cycle modes with Shift+Tab:

| Mode | What it does | |------|--------------| | manual | You drive the browser; AI generates the client from captured traffic. | | agent | An AI agent drives the browser autonomously (Playwright MCP or Chrome DevTools MCP). | | engineer | Re-run generation on a previous capture (engineer <run_id>). | | collector | Agent collects structured data (JSON/CSV) using web search + fetch. |

Agent mode providers:

• auto (default): Playwright MCP, single workflow for browsing + reverse engineering.
• chrome-mcp: drives your real Chrome so you keep existing sessions/cookies. Requires Chrome 146+ and Node.js 20.19+.

Configuration

Settings live in ~/.reverse-api/config.json and can be edited via /settings in the CLI:

{
  "agent_provider": "auto",
  "claude_code_model": "claude-sonnet-4-6",
  "collector_model": "claude-sonnet-4-6",
  "opencode_model": "claude-sonnet-4-6",
  "opencode_provider": "anthropic",
  "copilot_model": "gpt-5",
  "cursor_model": "composer-2",
  "output_dir": null,
  "output_language": "python",
  "real_time_sync": true,
  "sdk": "claude"
}

• Models: Sonnet 4.6 (default), Opus 4.6 (most capable), Haiku 4.5 (fastest). For OpenCode see models.dev.
• SDK: claude (default), opencode, cursor, or copilot (GitHub Copilot).
• Output language: python, javascript, or typescript.

CLI

Slash commands inside the CLI:

• /settings: configure model, SDK, agent provider, and sync settings.
• /history: list past runs with timestamps, costs, and status.
• /messages <run_id>: view detailed message logs for a run.
• /help (alias: /commands): show the command list.
• /exit (alias: /quit): leave the CLI.

Scriptable subcommands (pipe to jq):

reverse-api-engineer agent --prompt "capture the public jobs api" \
  --url https://example.com/jobs --json | jq

reverse-api-engineer list --json
reverse-api-engineer show <run_id> --json
reverse-api-engineer run <run_id> --file api_client.py \
  --no-interactive --auto-install -- --org acme

Pass --no-interactive (and/or --json) to skip prompts. With --json, stdout is one JSON document and logs go to stderr.

agent --json schema

| Field | Type | Notes | |------------------|---------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------------| | schema_version | int | Currently 1. | | status | "ok" | "error" | Top-level result. | | run_id | string | null | Use with show / engineer / run. | | prompt | string | | | url | string | null | | | mode | string | null | "auto" or "chrome-mcp". | | har_path | string | null | Captured HAR. | | script_path | string | null | Generated client. | | usage | object | {input_tokens, output_tokens, total_cost}. | | error | string | null | When status == "error". |

Exit codes

| Code | Meaning | |------|---------| | 0 | Success. | | 1 | Runtime error. | | 2 | Missing required arg under --no-interactive / --json. |

For run, the exit code is the underlying script's return code on success, 1 if no script was found, or non-zero if --no-interactive would have had to prompt.

Output locations

• ~/.reverse-api/runs/scripts/{run_id}/: permanent storage
• ./scripts/{descriptive_name}/: local copy with a readable name
• Collector: ./collected/{folder_name}/ (items.json, items.csv, README.md)

Caveats

• Generated code runs locally via Claude Code, so review before executing.
• Sites with aggressive bot detection may block capture or require manual interaction.

Development

git clone https://github.com/kalil0321/reverse-api-engineer.git
cd reverse-api-engineer
uv sync
uv run reverse-api-engineer

Build: ./scripts/clean_build.sh. Requires Python 3.11+, Playwright browsers, and an API key for agent mode.

License

MIT. See LICENSE.