Interact MCP: Faster Web Browsing for Claude Code with Persistent Chromium

Interact MCP is a Model Context Protocol implementation that enables faster web browsing for Claude Code and other MCP clients by maintaining a persistent Chromium browser in-process. The tool addresses performance limitations in existing solutions like Playwright MCP, which reportedly takes 2-5 seconds per browser action.

Performance Improvements

The key optimization comes from keeping the browser instance alive between calls. The first interaction takes approximately 3 seconds, but subsequent actions complete in 5-50 milliseconds, representing a 10-50x speed improvement over Playwright MCP's per-action latency.

Core Features

• Ref System: Instead of CSS selectors, you call interact_snapshot to get element references like [textbox] "Email", [textbox] "Password", [button] "Sign In". You then interact using references like interact_click({ ref: "@e3" }).
• Snapshot Diffing: Shows exactly what changed on the page after an action.
• Cookie Import: Import cookies from Chrome, Arc, or Brave browsers to test authenticated pages without manual login.
• 46 Total Tools: Includes form handling, screenshots, JavaScript evaluation, network capture, and responsive testing capabilities.

Technical Details

The browser automation architecture is ported from Garry Tan's gstack project and wrapped in the MCP protocol. The tool is MIT licensed and works with Claude Code, Cursor, or any MCP client. The GitHub repository is available at https://github.com/TacosyHorchata/interact-mcp.

This type of tool is particularly useful for developers testing user flows where multiple browser interactions are required, as the persistent connection eliminates the overhead of browser initialization for each action.