plannotator

Plannotator

⭐️ NEW: Plannotator Inbox is the missing layer between you and managing multi-agent work.

Plannotator is a local, browser-based review surface for AI coding agents: Claude Code, Codex, Copilot CLI, Gemini CLI, OpenCode, Kiro, Droid, Amp, DeepSeek Harness, and Pi.

It plugs directly into your agent through its hooks and commands. When the agent proposes a plan, html, or finishes writing code, the work opens in your browser and you mark it up, comment, and send feedback directly to the agent for it to act on it.

Review documents, plans, and agent messages

Annotate plans, specs, messages, html, then send the feedback to your agent.

Code Review

Review local changes or remote PRs. Comment on diffs, suggest code. Your comments go back to the agent. Works with Git, GitButler, Jujutsu (jj), Perforce (p4), GitHub, and GitLab.

Annotate HTML Artifacts

Plannotator Inbox

The Plannotator Inbox is one local window where your agents leave you messages, questions, files, and guided reviews while they keep working. Answer a question with a click, annotate a file, and press Send when you can. Nothing holds an agent session open while you do, and your reply goes back to the session that asked.

plannotator inbox

Claude Code, Pi, and OpenCode connect through Plannotator's plugins, and your replies arrive as their next turn. Any other agent reaches it over MCP with plannotator inbox mcp, and plannotator inbox --help is the guide an agent reads. Watch the demo · More on the Inbox · Docs

Herdr Annotate: Plannotator in the Terminal

Herdr Annotate brings Plannotator-style review to the terminal: annotate terminal text, review whole Markdown documents and your coding agent's replies inside Herdr, and send the feedback straight back to the agent as its next message. Works with Claude Code, Codex, Pi, Copilot CLI, and Droid replies. Annotations are saved in the Plannotator data directory, so terminal reviews and app reviews compound.

herdr plugin install plannotator/herdr-annotate

Prefer it standalone? Plannotator TUI powers the document review and runs without Herdr: brew install plannotator/tap/plannotator-tui.

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Commands

On Codex, swap the slash commands for !plannotator … (e.g. !plannotator review) or the $plannotator-* skills.

Annotate

/plannotator-annotate README.md                  # Local markdown file
/plannotator-annotate src/                       # Browse and annotate files in a folder
/plannotator-annotate https://docs.rs/…          # Fetch and annotate any URL
/plannotator-annotate report.html --render-html  # Render HTML as-is instead of converting
/plannotator-last                                # Annotate the agent's last message

Need a realistic document to try? Copy the product requirements document template and filled example as Markdown.

Code review

/plannotator-review                    # Review uncommitted changes
/plannotator-review <github-pr-url>    # Review a GitHub pull request
/plannotator-review <gitlab-mr-url>    # Review a GitLab merge request
plannotator review --gitbutler         # Review an active GitButler workspace
plannotator review --patch-file reading.diff # Review a static caller-supplied unified diff

GitButler users can review the whole workspace, one stack, or one branch layer. See the GitButler workflow guide.

Plan mode

No command needed. Plan mode is wired in through each harness's hooks. Any time your agent creates a plan, the markdown review surface opens for you.

CLI

plannotator sessions                   # List active Plannotator sessions
plannotator sessions --open 1          # Reopen a session in the browser
plannotator archive                    # Browse saved plan decisions read-only

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Privacy and network behavior

Plannotator does not collect usage telemetry or analytics. Plans, diffs, annotations, drafts, history, and configuration stay local by default.

Each plan review, annotate, archive, share-portal, and code-review app surface checks GitHub for the latest Plannotator release when it loads. This sends no plan or review content and gives the Plannotator project owner no usage analytics, although GitHub receives an ordinary request. There is currently no opt-out setting for the release check. Local Git code review can also query the configured origin with git ls-remote to detect the default branch and a stale baseline; it does not send the local diff. That remote query runs when the review opens, when the page loads its diff, when you switch the diff type or base (including the "Diff out of date · Refresh" button), and when you press Fetch — never on a timer, so an idle review page makes no network calls. Turn it off entirely with plannotator review --no-git-remote-check, PLANNOTATOR_GIT_REMOTE_CHECK=0, or { "gitRemoteCheck": false } in ~/.plannotator/config.json; the compare target then comes from local refs only and the "behind GitHub" banner never appears.

Content leaves the local workflow only when a network feature needs it:

• URL annotation fetches the requested site, through Jina Reader by default for public pages or directly when Jina is disabled or unavailable.
• GitHub and GitLab review uses your authenticated CLI and Git remote to retrieve PR or MR data.
• Ask AI and review agents send the selected question and relevant plan, document, repository, or diff context to your configured provider. When Ask AI is answered by the agent session that opened Plannotator ("Ask this session"), the question goes to that session instead.
• Sharing sends the complete link to whoever or whatever service you use to deliver it. Encrypted short links upload ciphertext to the paste service.
• Workspaces is a separate hosted product, so the open source app's local-storage model does not apply to content placed there.

The privacy policy documents these boundaries and the hosted website and waitlist data.

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Link sharing

Open source asynchronous link sharing remains available for compatibility but is moving to deprecated support. Workspaces is the primary direction for team sharing. No removal date has been announced.

Share a plan with a teammate and they can annotate it themselves. Import their feedback and send it straight back to your agent.

Small markdown shares are compressed into the URL fragment. The fragment is not included in the browser's request to the share portal, but it is not encrypted. Anyone or any messaging service with the complete link can read the shared content. The portal host still receives ordinary request metadata.

Large markdown and raw HTML shares use a short-link service. The share payload is encrypted with AES-256-GCM before upload, the server stores only ciphertext, and the key is kept in the URL fragment rather than sent in the paste request. Anyone with the complete link can decrypt it. Hosted pastes expire after 7 days.

Same model as PrivateBin. The paste service is self-hostable.

Sharing can be disabled entirely with PLANNOTATOR_SHARE=disabled.

Workspaces is the primary path for hosted team collaboration.

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Install

One installer covers almost every agent. It installs the plannotator binary, auto-detects your installed agents, and configures hooks, skills, and slash commands for each:

# macOS / Linux / WSL
curl -fsSL https://plannotator.ai/install.sh | bash

# Windows PowerShell
irm https://plannotator.ai/install.ps1 | iex

The installer downloads the binary from GitHub Releases. A full install can also contact GitHub for release resolution and agent files, Ataraxy-Labs/sem for the optional sem sidecar, and npm for Pi, selected extra skills, or the managed agent-terminal runtime. Pinning --version skips only GitHub API release resolution, not the release download. See the privacy policy for the complete network boundaries.

Want just the binary and nothing else? Pass --minimal (or export PLANNOTATOR_MINIMAL=1) to install only the plannotator binary to ~/.local/bin, skipping every skill, hook, slash command, and per-agent config:

curl -fsSL https://plannotator.ai/install.sh | bash -s -- --minimal

Then finish the step for your agent:

Agent	After the installer	Details
Amp	Copy plannotator.ts into ~/.config/amp/plugins/, then plugins: reload. Workflows live in the command palette.	README
Claude Code	/plugin marketplace add backnotprop/plannotator, then /plugin install plannotator@plannotator. Restart Claude Code.	README
Codex	Nothing. Plan review is enabled automatically via Codex's experimental Stop hook (macOS/Linux/WSL; on native Windows, Codex hooks are experimental and the installer prints manual setup steps). $plannotator-review, $plannotator-annotate, and $plannotator-last skills included.	README
Copilot CLI	/plugin marketplace add backnotprop/plannotator, then /plugin install plannotator-copilot@plannotator. Restart. Plan review activates in plan mode (Shift+Tab).	README
DeepSeek Harness	Add @plannotator/dsh on DSH's Plugins page, or run dsh plugin --profile <profile> add @plannotator/dsh. Plan review opens on exit_plan_mode. The plugin adds /plannotator-review, /plannotator-annotate and /plannotator-last, which open without blocking the session.	README
Droid	droid plugin marketplace add https://github.com/backnotprop/plannotator, then droid plugin install plannotator@plannotator. Commands only, no plan interception yet.	README
Gemini CLI	Nothing. The hook, policy, and slash commands are configured automatically. Requires Gemini CLI 0.36.0+.	README
Kiro CLI	Nothing. Skills and an example agent are installed automatically. Try kiro-cli chat --agent plannotator.	README
OpenCode	Add "plugin": ["@plannotator/opencode@latest"] to opencode.json. Restart OpenCode.	README
Pi	Skip the installer. Just pi install npm:@plannotator/pi-extension. Start Pi with --plan, or toggle with /plannotator-plan-mode.	README
T3 Code	For Claude threads in T3: run plannotator t3 --help and follow its two steps (sign in to T3 once, add the --t3 MCP entry). Your Inbox replies then arrive in the thread as new turns.	README

Updating: run the installer again for the binary and slash commands. It also updates an installed Claude Code plugin when the claude command is on your PATH (opt out with --skip-claude-plugin); otherwise run claude plugin marketplace update plannotator, then claude plugin update plannotator@plannotator, then restart Claude Code (refreshing the marketplace alone does not update the plugin). Pi: pi update --extensions (a plain pi update updates only Pi).

On Claude Code 2.1.287 or newer, plan review, code review and annotate don't make Claude wait: Claude ends its turn and your decision arrives later as a message. Set PLANNOTATOR_CLAUDE_MOD=0 to go back to the classic flow.

Full walkthroughs live in the installation docs.

Uninstall

The safe default removes recognized Plannotator-installed components and keeps your local plans, history, drafts, guides, and settings:

plannotator uninstall

Use --purge for a full removal of known local Plannotator data as well:

plannotator uninstall --purge

Purge requires typing purge at the prompt and explains that the data is local-only: it is not stored on a Plannotator server and cannot be recovered. For automation, pass --yes (or -y); non-interactive removal refuses to run without it. Use --dry-run to preview recognized work without making changes. Host integrations are always part of uninstall. If a broken or unavailable host prevents safe cleanup, the command names the blocking plugin manager or configuration, gives exact manual cleanup instructions, and stops before deleting the binary. Complete that cleanup and rerun uninstall. It also keeps the binary when an agent's config file can't be read (another tool's too), or when a hook it did not install still runs Plannotator. The error names the file, the tool, and what to do. A plannotator-inbox entry you added yourself, or a Claude Code or Droid plugin installed for one project, is named with how to remove it and does not keep the binary. These mechanics keep the ordinary confirmation default-negative, make the irreversible outcome require a stronger explicit word, and still give package managers and scripts a conventional non-interactive flag.

The command covers the conventional macOS, Linux, WSL, and Windows binary locations; the managed sem sidecar and agent-terminal runtime; installer skills, commands, hooks, policies, caches, and recognizable Amp/Kiro files; and detected Claude Code, Copilot CLI, Droid, Pi, and VS Code installations through their host CLIs. Shared JSONC settings are edited surgically, while strict JSON updates preserve the file's indentation, line endings, and trailing-newline style. Custom or unrecognized files, separately installed optional skills, project-local integrations, external plan-save locations, and invalid configs are preserved (malformed host config is a fail-safe error). If cleanup reports an error, the CLI remains available for a safe retry, and its Windows PATH entry is retained or restored when possible. If PATH restoration itself fails, the output gives the full CLI path for retry and asks for manual PATH repair. For safety, purge refuses filesystem roots, the home directory, the shared temporary directory, symlinked data directories, and non-directory data paths. Existing paths are compared by filesystem identity, so case aliases, symlinks, hardlinks, and bind mounts cannot bypass the root/home/ancestor checks. That identity and every containment guard are revalidated after awaited host commands, immediately before the synchronous data-removal block; a replaced data directory is refused without touching either the old or replacement data. If your dedicated data directory is symlinked, point PLANNOTATOR_DATA_DIR at its resolved target and retry.

If you installed only the standalone Pi extension and do not have the plannotator CLI, use pi remove npm:@plannotator/pi-extension.

Add to ~/.claude/settings.json:

{
  "hooks": {
    "PermissionRequest": [
      {
        "matcher": "ExitPlanMode",
        "hooks": [
          {
            "type": "command",
            "command": "plannotator",
            "timeout": 345600
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }
}

curl -fsSL https://plannotator.ai/install.sh | bash -s -- --version vX.Y.Z

& ([scriptblock]::Create((irm https://plannotator.ai/install.ps1))) -Version vX.Y.Z

Try it

The fastest way to see what Plannotator does is to invoke it yourself, right now, from your agent:

/plannotator-last                   # annotate the agent's last reply
/plannotator-review                 # review your current diff, PR-style
/plannotator-annotate report.html   # annotate any file, folder, or URL

(Slash commands in most agents; $plannotator-* skills in Codex, command palette in Amp.)

Plan review needs no command at all. The next time your agent proposes a plan, it opens in your browser automatically.

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How it works

Plan review

Agent calls ExitPlanMode
  -> PermissionRequest hook fires
  -> Local server reads plan from hook input
  -> Browser opens with review UI
  -> You annotate and approve/deny
  -> Approve: agent proceeds
  -> Deny: structured feedback sent to agent
  -> Agent revises, plan diff shows what changed

Code review

You run /plannotator-review
  -> git diff captures changes (or PR fetched by URL)
  -> Browser opens with diff viewer
  -> Annotate lines, stage/unstage files
  -> Send feedback: returned to agent session
  -> Approve: "LGTM" sent

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Integrations

VS Code: Open plans in editor tabs, view diffs inline, add annotations from the editor gutter. Install from the VS Code Marketplace.

Obsidian: Auto-save approved plans to a vault with YAML frontmatter, tags from the plan title, and backlinks for graph connectivity. Configure in Plannotator's Settings panel.

Bear: Save plans as Bear notes with nested tags and project metadata.

Notion: Save plans as Markdown child pages under a shared Notion page. Set NOTION_TOKEN in the environment that starts Plannotator, then configure the parent page in Settings.

GitHub / GitLab: Pass any PR or MR URL to /plannotator-review and review it with the full diff viewer, annotations, and file tree.

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Remote / SSH / devcontainer

Plannotator auto-detects SSH sessions and switches to fixed port 19432. For a different port, or in a devcontainer or Docker:

export PLANNOTATOR_REMOTE=1
export PLANNOTATOR_PORT=9999  # forward this port

VS Code devcontainers forward the port automatically (check the Ports tab). For raw SSH, add this to ~/.ssh/config, using your PLANNOTATOR_PORT value if you set one:

Host your-server
    LocalForward 19432 localhost:19432

In remote mode the server listens on every interface (0.0.0.0) with no login, so anyone who can reach the port can use it, even when you use an SSH tunnel. Keep the port closed to networks you don't trust.

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Security

Every released binary ships with a SHA256 sidecar. SLSA provenance attestations are available from v0.17.2. The current release workflow also attaches a CycloneDX JSON SBOM, evaluates it with a fresh Grype database before anything is attested or published, and creates a GitHub/Sigstore SBOM attestation for the shipped binaries and npm tarballs.

The SBOM is intentionally labeled as a release-wide Syft inventory of the monorepo's locked build inputs and dependencies. It is not an exact per-binary runtime inventory: Bun standalone executables do not expose their bundled JavaScript package metadata to Syft. The canonical installation and verification docs cover the existing installer path; the exact new SBOM commands are included below and must be copied to that Mintlify page before the first SBOM-enabled release.

The release gate rejects scanner-side ignored matches and treats unknown applicability conservatively as runtime when evaluating CISA KEV and fixable Critical findings. Its explicit Grype configuration, complete JSON results, database status, and repository policy decision remain available as workflow evidence.

To verify a released Linux x64 binary, its existing provenance, and the new SBOM evidence directly:

tag=vX.Y.Z
version="${tag#v}"
mkdir -p /tmp/plannotator-release-verify
gh release download "$tag" --repo backnotprop/plannotator \
  --pattern 'plannotator-linux-x64*' \
  --pattern "plannotator-${version}-release-sbom.cdx.json*" \
  --dir /tmp/plannotator-release-verify

(cd /tmp/plannotator-release-verify && sha256sum --check plannotator-linux-x64.sha256)
(cd /tmp/plannotator-release-verify && sha256sum --check "plannotator-${version}-release-sbom.cdx.json.sha256")

gh attestation verify /tmp/plannotator-release-verify/plannotator-linux-x64 \
  --repo backnotprop/plannotator --source-ref "refs/tags/$tag" \
  --signer-workflow backnotprop/plannotator/.github/workflows/release.yml \
  --predicate-type https://slsa.dev/provenance/v1

gh attestation verify /tmp/plannotator-release-verify/plannotator-linux-x64 \
  --repo backnotprop/plannotator --source-ref "refs/tags/$tag" \
  --signer-workflow backnotprop/plannotator/.github/workflows/release.yml \
  --predicate-type https://cyclonedx.org/bom

These are separate claims over the same artifact digest: provenance identifies its builder/source/workflow, while the CycloneDX predicate describes the release-wide inventory. The release runbook also canonicalizes the downloaded SBOM and attested predicate with jq -S and compares them.

To verify on install:

curl -fsSL https://plannotator.ai/install.sh | bash -s -- --verify-attestation

Requires the gh CLI, but no login: the installer fetches the attestation bundle from GitHub's public attestations API and verifies it with gh attestation verify --bundle (the extraction needs node, python3, or jq on PATH; gh's authenticated fetch is the fallback). Can also be set persistently in ~/.plannotator/config.json:

{ "verifyAttestation": true }

Installer verification remains opt-in and verifies SLSA build provenance; normal installation does not require gh. See the canonical installation docs for details.

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Configuration

Settings are saved in cookies (not localStorage) because each hook invocation runs on a random port. You can also set options through environment variables or ~/.plannotator/config.json.

Optional Vim controls

Plan and annotate views offer a default-off Vim controls profile under Settings → Vim. Once enabled, focus the document and use j / k to move one rendered block at a time. After l refines into a semantic level, j / k move among sibling rows, cells, or inline targets; h moves back to the containing target. Refining past the deepest target enters text. v starts characterwise Visual selection and V selects whole blocks. Space opens the normal annotation toolbar; c, d, m, and t select comment, redline, markup, and label actions. The same semantic target graph drives pointer Pinpoint and keyboard navigation. Press ? in the document for the contextual key reference. Inputs, dialogs, editors, Tab, and all pointer interactions retain their native behavior. The document takes focus automatically when the page is otherwise neutral; press Escape from app chrome to return to it without clicking. An additional default-off Vim HUD toggle appears beneath Vim controls. It uses the product-demo styling for the live target reticle and navigation context. Its bottom-right Key panel is independently hideable while the reticle remains active; ? still opens the complete key map on demand. The panel shows recent handled keys, the current block/line/word/Visual phase, and the command meaning without capturing text typed into comments or other controls. See Vim controls for the interaction contract and implementation architecture.

Variable	Description
PLANNOTATOR_REMOTE	1/true for remote mode, 0/false for local, unset for SSH auto-detection
PLANNOTATOR_PORT	Fixed port (default: random locally, 19432 remote)
PLANNOTATOR_BROWSER	Custom browser to open plans in. none (also false, 0, off, no, true, 1, :) opens no browser at all; the session URL is always printed.
PLANNOTATOR_AI	disabled to disable Ask AI, Review Agents, and Guided Review; the annotate agent terminal is separate
PLANNOTATOR_SHARE	disabled to turn off URL sharing
PLANNOTATOR_SHARE_URL	Custom base URL for share links (self-hosted portal)
PLANNOTATOR_PASTE_URL	Base URL of the paste service API
PLANNOTATOR_ORIGIN	Override agent detection: claude-code, amp, droid, opencode, codex, copilot-cli, gemini-cli, kiro-cli, pi
PLANNOTATOR_JINA	0/false to disable Jina Reader for URL annotation
JINA_API_KEY	Jina Reader API key for higher rate limits
PLANNOTATOR_DATA_DIR	Base directory for Plannotator-managed files (plans, history, drafts, config.json). Default: ~/.plannotator; if that directory doesn't exist and $XDG_DATA_HOME is set to an absolute path, $XDG_DATA_HOME/plannotator is used instead (also when ~/.plannotator holds none of Plannotator's data but the XDG folder does). plannotator data-dir prints the folder in use

Plannotator-managed files live under ~/.plannotator by default. Some UI preferences are stored in functional browser cookies. To relocate the files (for example, for an XDG-clean home):

export PLANNOTATOR_DATA_DIR=~/.local/share/plannotator

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Development

bun install

bun run dev:hook       # Plan review server
bun run dev:review     # Code review editor
bun run dev:marketing  # Marketing site (plannotator.ai)
bun run dev:vscode     # VS Code extension (watch mode)

Build

bun run build          # Main targets (hook + opencode + dsh)
bun run build:hook     # Single-file HTML for the hook server
bun run build:review   # Code review editor
bun run build:opencode # OpenCode plugin
bun run build:dsh      # DeepSeek Harness plugin
bun run build:vscode   # VS Code extension

Build order matters. The hook build copies pre-built HTML from apps/review/dist/. If you change UI code in packages/ui/, packages/editor/, or packages/review-editor/, rebuild the review app first:

bun run --cwd apps/review build && bun run build:hook

Test the plugin locally:

claude --plugin-dir ./apps/hook

Full binary build:

bun run --cwd apps/review build && bun run build:hook && \
  bun build apps/hook/server/index.ts --compile --outfile ~/.local/bin/plannotator

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License

Copyright 2025-2026 backnotprop

Dual-licensed under Apache 2.0 or MIT at your option.

Contributions are dual-licensed under the same terms unless you explicitly state otherwise.