helium-devtools-mcp

A drop-in fork of chrome-devtools-mcp that targets the Helium browser instead of Chrome whenever the stable browser channel is selected. This build mirrors the upstream v1.1.1 codebase and is published as 1.1.1-helium.1.

What changed

For the stable channel (the default — i.e. when no --executablePath, --channel, --browserUrl, or --wsEndpoint is given):

• Launch → starts Helium instead of Chrome.
• --autoConnect → attaches to a running Helium's own user-data directory (reading its DevToolsActivePort) instead of Chrome's default profile, so the MCP controls the Helium window you already have open.

Other channels (beta, canary, dev), an explicit --executablePath, --browserUrl, --wsEndpoint, or a custom --userDataDir all behave exactly as upstream.

Privacy

This fork is configured for a private, local-first setup and does not phone home by default:

• usageStatistics and performanceCrux default to false (no Google usage telemetry, no sending performance-trace URLs to the CrUX API).
• The npm update check is disabled (no startup network request). You get the latest build via npx helium-devtools-mcp@latest; opt back in with HELIUM_ENABLE_UPDATE_CHECK=1.

Connecting to a running Helium

1. In Helium, enable remote debugging at helium://inspect/#remote-debugging. (It writes a DevToolsActivePort file into Helium's profile. Note: it disables the HTTP /json endpoints, so --browserUrl will not work — use --autoConnect.)
2. Run with auto-connect: npx helium-devtools-mcp@latest --autoConnect

The server resolves Helium's profile per-platform; override with HELIUM_USER_DATA_DIR. The Helium binary (for launching) is found via helium-paths or HELIUM_EXECUTABLE.

Usage

# Launch a fresh Helium:
npx helium-devtools-mcp@latest

# Or attach to a Helium you already have open (remote debugging enabled):
npx helium-devtools-mcp@latest --autoConnect

For all other flags and tool documentation, see the upstream README.