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Wisp AI Assistant

Wisp is a free, open-source (MIT), hotkey-driven AI overlay for Windows, macOS, and Linux that reads your on-screen context, works with any model provider, and acts as both an MCP client and MCP server.

Starting at$0
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In Plain English

Wisp is a free, open-source (MIT), hotkey-driven AI overlay for Windows, macOS, and Linux that reads your on-screen context, works with any model provider, and acts as both an MCP client and MCP server.

OverviewFeaturesPricingUse CasesFAQ

Overview

Wisp is an open-source, hotkey-driven AI overlay for the desktop, written entirely in Python and released under the MIT license. Instead of switching to a chat app, you highlight text, press a hotkey, pick an action, and Wisp streams the answer into a compact bubble or pastes it back at your cursor. It can capture exactly the context you allow: selected text, clipboard, the focused app, open documents, browser pages, recent files, or a drawn screen snip sent to a vision model. Voice is built in, with local speech-to-text via faster-whisper and on-device or cloud TTS. Wisp is local-first: there is no hosted storage layer, provider keys live in your OS keychain, optional memory is stored locally with a viewer, and privacy mode can warn or redact before sensitive context leaves your machine. You bring your own model provider — Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, Groq, OpenRouter, Mistral, local Ollama or any OpenAI-compatible server, and many more. MCP support is prominent and two-way: a bundled MCP bridge addon acts as an MCP client, exposing any Model Context Protocol server's tools to Wisp's model, while the Wisp Context Server is a local MCP stdio server that lets trusted clients like Claude Desktop, Cursor, and Codex read live desktop context through five read-only tools. A sandboxed addon system and an agent task framework round out an unusually extensible free assistant for Windows 10+, macOS 13+, and Linux (X11, with Wayland in progress).

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Key Features

Feature information is available on the official website.

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Pricing Plans

Free (open source)

$0

  • ✓MIT-licensed, full source on GitHub
  • ✓Packaged apps for Windows, macOS, and Linux
  • ✓Bring your own model provider key or local server
  • ✓All features included: overlay, voice, vision snips, memory, addons, MCP
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Best Use Cases

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Explaining, rewriting, or summarizing selected text anywhere on the desktop without breaking flow

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Privacy-conscious users who want a local-first assistant with no hosted storage

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Letting Claude Desktop, Cursor, or Codex read live desktop context through the Wisp Context Server MCP server

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Extending an assistant with custom Python addons, tools, and MCP servers

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Running at zero cost with free-tier providers or local models

Pros & Cons

✓ Pros

  • ✓Genuinely free and MIT-licensed — no subscription, no data collection, no hosted account
  • ✓Two-way MCP support is rare in desktop assistants and unlocks powerful agent workflows
  • ✓Bring-your-own-provider covers 20+ backends, including fully local Ollama/LM Studio
  • ✓Voice runs on-device by default (faster-whisper + Kokoro), keeping audio off the cloud
  • ✓Cross-platform: Windows 10+, macOS 13+, and Linux (X11) all shipped from the same Python codebase
  • ✓Sandboxed Python addon system makes it extensible without forking the app

✗ Cons

  • ✗You supply and pay for your own model keys — no free hosted inference tier
  • ✗Wayland support on Linux is still in progress; X11 is the current sweet spot
  • ✗Being a solo open-source project means release cadence and support depend on the maintainer
  • ✗Python packaging can make first-run setup fiddlier than a signed native app
  • ✗Screen-snip vision requires a vision-capable model, which costs more per call

Frequently Asked Questions

How much does Wisp AI Assistant cost?+

Wisp AI Assistant pricing starts at $0. They offer a single pricing plan.
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Quick Info

Category

ai-assistant

Website

github.com/SunnyLich/Wisp-AI-Assistant
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