FAQ
Questions, answered.
Loupe is an open-source, local Windows AI website builder and web-design studio. AI agents build real websites, every AI edit is automatically verified against the real render, and you finish the rest by hand — select, move, resize, edit — on the same live page. Bring your own API keys or the AI subscriptions you already pay for. MIT-licensed.
What is Loupe?
Loupe is an open-source, local Windows desktop AI website builder and web-design studio. AI agents build a real website, then you refine it by hand directly on the live page — point at any element and ask, or select, move, resize and edit — and every AI edit is automatically verified against the real render before it's considered done. It runs on your own API keys or existing AI subscriptions. MIT-licensed.
Is Loupe an AI website builder?
Yes — Loupe is an open-source AI website builder, with a difference: instead of only generating a site in the cloud, AI agents build it locally and you then refine it by hand directly on the live page, with every AI edit automatically verified against the real render. It's a local, build-and-refine AI web-design tool for Windows that runs on your own API keys or existing AI subscriptions.
Is Loupe free and open source?
Yes. Loupe is MIT-licensed and fully open source at github.com/winchxyz/loupe. There's no paid tier and nothing to upsell — you can read every line, build it from source, and run it entirely on your own machine. It's an early (v0.1), solo-built project maintained in the open.
What platforms does Loupe run on?
Loupe is a Windows 10/11 (64-bit) desktop app — the tested, supported platform. It's built with Electron, so building from source may run on macOS/Linux, but those aren't officially tested or shipped yet. Windows binaries (installer or portable) are on the GitHub releases page.
Does Loupe use my own API key or subscription (BYOK)?
Yes — Loupe is bring-your-own-key. It runs on the Claude API, your own OpenRouter/OpenAI/Gemini/xAI keys, or the CLI subscriptions you already pay for (Claude Code, Codex, Grok, Copilot) as build engines. Keys are stored locally and sent only to the matching provider — nothing routes through a server. No per-seat cloud markup.
How is Loupe different from Onlook?
Onlook is an open-source visual editor that needs an existing React/Next+Tailwind codebase and leans on a cloud version. Loupe is a local desktop studio that builds a site for you from a prompt and centers a verified closed loop — every AI edit is automatically checked against the real render. Pick Onlook if you're on Mac/web editing an existing React app; pick Loupe if you want a local, Windows, build-and-refine loop on your own keys.
How is Loupe different from v0, Bolt, or Lovable?
v0, Bolt, and Lovable are cloud, chat-first builders — great at the first draft but harder for fine visual control, and your code lives on their platform with per-seat/token pricing. Loupe runs locally on your own keys, gives you hands-on control directly on the live render, and automatically verifies each edit against the real browser. Choose them for instant cloud deploy; choose Loupe for local, private, hands-on refinement.
How is Loupe different from Open Design?
Open Design is a popular open-source desktop app where your coding agent designs through chat: you describe, it generates, you describe again. Loupe closes the loop instead: every AI edit is automatically verified against the real render, and you refine the result directly on the live page with a real visual editor (select, move, resize, edit text and style). Pick Open Design for chat-driven generation across many formats; pick Loupe when the page must end up exactly right.
What does "verified against the real render" mean?
Verification is automatic and per-edit — not a screenshot you have to request. After every visual edit, Loupe reads the real rendered DOM and geometry from the live page and takes a before/after pixel diff; if nothing actually changed on screen, it re-feeds the real render and tries again. "Done" means the render is genuinely correct, not assumed.
Can I edit an AI-built site by hand?
Yes. Loupe gives you a real visual editor on the live site: select, move, resize, rotate, snap, align, auto-layout, and edit text and style by hand, all persisted as clean responsive CSS with one undo/redo across both AI and manual edits. You can also hand it back to the AI to assemble or refine what you did.
Build one, then perfect it.
Windows 10 / 11 · bring your own keys · local & private · MIT.