Make This Better
Feedback widget with screenshots, annotations, and AI triage.
Why
You ship with AI agents. Your users hit bugs you never see in dev. They leave. You never find out why.
This widget gives your users a way to report exactly what went wrong — annotated screenshot, console errors, DOM state, browser info — in two clicks. AI triage turns that into a structured task your coding agent (Claude Code, Cursor, Codex) picks up automatically. The agent ships the fix. The user gets notified.
No more "can you describe what happened?" No more lost screenshots in Slack. The full loop, from frustrated user to shipped fix, runs without you context-switching.
Quick Start
CDN (2 lines)
<script src="https://unpkg.com/makethisbetter@1"></script> <script> MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_YOUR_KEY' }) </script>
npm
npm install makethisbetter
import { MakeThisBetter } from 'makethisbetter' MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_YOUR_KEY' })
That's it. A feedback tab appears on your page.
How It Works
User clicks feedback tab
-> Annotates the problem (click to pin, drag to draw)
-> Adds a comment
-> Submits
+-- Screenshot captured automatically
+-- Console errors collected
+-- Page context assembled (URL, browser, OS, selectors)
+-- Sent to Make This Better API
+-- AI asks a clarifying question if needed
-> Dashboard shows structured feedback
-> AI triage produces an agent-ready task
-> Your coding agent picks it up and ships the fix
-> User gets notified: the fix is live
Framework Guides
React / Next.js
// app/providers.tsx (App Router) or pages/_app.tsx (Pages Router) 'use client' import { useEffect } from 'react' export function FeedbackProvider({ user }: { user?: { id: string, email?: string } }) { useEffect(() => { import('makethisbetter').then(({ MakeThisBetter }) => { MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_MTB_KEY!, user }) }) return () => { import('makethisbetter').then(({ MakeThisBetter }) => MakeThisBetter.destroy()) } }, [user]) return null }
Vue / Nuxt
// plugins/makethisbetter.client.ts (Nuxt) or main.ts (Vue) import { MakeThisBetter } from 'makethisbetter' export default defineNuxtPlugin(() => { MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: useRuntimeConfig().public.mtbKey, }) return { provide: { mtbDestroy: () => MakeThisBetter.destroy() } } })
Astro
<!-- src/components/Feedback.astro --> <script> import { MakeThisBetter } from 'makethisbetter' MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: import.meta.env.PUBLIC_MTB_KEY }) </script>
Rails
<%# app/views/layouts/application.html.erb %> <body> <%= yield %> <%# Turbo replaces <body> on every visit, taking any script-appended element with it. Render the host yourself and mark it permanent, or the widget is rebuilt after each navigation and anything mid-flight — a half-written report, a screen recording — is lost. %> <div id="mtb-widget-host" data-turbo-permanent></div> <% if current_user&.admin? %> <script src="https://unpkg.com/makethisbetter@1"></script> <script> MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: '<%= Rails.application.credentials.mtb_project_key %>', user: { id: '<%= current_user.id %>', email: '<%= current_user.email %>' } }) </script> <% end %> </body>
The host must sit inside <body> — Turbo pairs permanent elements by id within
the body snapshot, so one placed in <head> is never matched and nothing
happens. It needs both the id and the attribute; either alone does nothing.
Only Turbo-driven apps need this. React, Vue and Svelte routers re-render inside
their own container and never replace <body>, so the host survives on its own.
Plain HTML / Static Sites
<script src="https://unpkg.com/makethisbetter@1"></script> <script> MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_YOUR_KEY' }) </script>
Features
Annotation
Click any element to pin it, or drag to draw a freeform highlight. The SDK captures the element's CSS selector, text content, and position.
Interaction Replay
Switch to Replay mode in the toolbar to capture an Interaction Replay (up to 60 seconds). It records rrweb DOM mutations and interaction events. It does not capture screen video or audio and does not request browser media permissions. The recorder loads lazily, so there is zero cost until the reporter starts a replay.
What a replay contains
| Captured | Not captured |
|---|---|
| The page's DOM structure and every mutation to it | Passwords, payment-card data, OTPs, access tokens, private keys, and other high-confidence credentials — replaced with [Filtered] |
| Visible text content and ordinary form values | Content inside an element you mark rr-block or rr-mask |
| Mouse positions, clicks, scrolls, viewport size | Screen video, audio, camera, microphone |
| Stylesheets needed to render the replay | Cookies, localStorage, HTTP request or response bodies |
Sensitive-data filtering is fixed and cannot be disabled through SDK configuration. Ordinary values such as search queries, issue descriptions, and internal form fields remain available because they are often necessary to reproduce a problem.
Excluding an element. Add rrweb's privacy classes to any page region that the SDK must not capture. These classes apply consistently to Interaction Replay, click and input breadcrumbs, annotation metadata, and screenshots:
class="rr-block"— hides the entire marked region while preserving its footprint.class="rr-mask"— hides text and form-control content while preserving the surrounding layout.
<div class="rr-block"><!-- never appears in a replay --></div> <span class="rr-mask">Account balance: $12,400</span>
If screenshot or Replay filtering cannot complete, that attachment is silently omitted and the text feedback still submits. Automated filtering cannot identify every site-specific secret, so use rr-block or rr-mask on sensitive application regions.
Frustration Detection
The SDK watches for signals that a user is struggling and proactively offers to collect feedback:
| Signal | Trigger |
|---|---|
| Rage click | 4+ clicks on the same interaction target within 1.5 seconds |
| Interaction error | Uncaught error within 2 seconds after an interaction |
| Dead click (DOM) | Command-style control with no response after 1 second |
| Rapid navigation | 3+ browser back/forward navigations within 5 seconds |
| Form failure | The same form fails validation twice within 30 seconds |
| Error page | Landing on a 404/500 error page |
Disable with frustrationDetection: false.
AI Clarification
Before submission, an AI assistant may ask one short follow-up question to clarify the real need — avoiding XY problems where users describe their attempted solution instead of the actual problem. Once the exchange is complete, the widget submits the feedback automatically.
Auto-Collected Context
Every submission automatically includes:
- Page URL origin and pathname, browser, OS, screen resolution
- Error type, script pathname, and line/column location (via
window.onerrorandwindow.onunhandledrejection) - Target element selector and text
- Annotated screenshot with privacy covers applied before upload (via
html-to-image) - Annotation coordinates and draw paths
Internationalization
Built-in support for 7 languages:
| Code | Language |
|---|---|
en |
English (default) |
zh-CN |
Chinese (Simplified) |
ja |
Japanese |
ko |
Korean |
es |
Spanish |
fr |
French |
de |
German |
Configuration
MakeThisBetter.init({ // Required projectKey: 'mtb_proj_xxx', // Optional locale: 'en', // UI language. Unset: falls back to <html lang>, then 'en' position: 'right', // Tab position: 'left' | 'right' tabText: 'Feedback', // Label on the docked tab. Unset: the locale's own wording brandColors: { // Optional semantic colors for the complete Widget primary: '#2563eb', hover: '#1d4ed8', active: '#1e40af', onPrimary: '#ffffff', }, entryMode: 'button', // 'button' docks a tab | 'api' renders none theme: 'auto', // 'light' | 'dark' | 'auto' frustrationDetection: true, // Proactive frustration prompts apiUrl: 'https://...', // Self-hosted API endpoint // User identification (recommended). // Ignored entirely when a valid userToken/userTokenFn JWT is present — // see Identity Verification below. user: { id: 'usr_123', email: 'alex@example.com', name: 'Alex Chen', }, })
Widget branding
Use brandColors to apply your product's semantic colors across the launcher,
annotation tools, focus and selection states, calls to action, Reporter bubbles,
and AI decoration. Supply all four values as six-digit hex colors. The SDK uses
them exactly as provided and does not generate a color scale.
MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_xxx', tabText: 'Report a problem', brandColors: { primary: '#2563eb', hover: '#1d4ed8', active: '#1e40af', onPrimary: '#ffffff', }, })
Success, error, warning, and recording colors keep their state meanings. An
incomplete group or any value that is not #RRGGBB rejects the complete group
and leaves the default Widget colors in place.
The /makethisbetter setup skill recommends brandColors only when it finds a
complete semantic group in your design system; it never guesses missing shades.
locale is resolved once, in this order: the locale you pass, then the page's
<html lang> attribute, then en. A tag with no exact match is retried without
its region (fr-CA → fr), and anything still unmatched falls back to en.
Changing the language at runtime
MakeThisBetter.setLocale('zh-CN') switches the language for the tab and for
anything opened afterwards. A popup that is already on screen keeps the language it
was opened in, so a reporter is never re-rendered mid-sentence. Call it before the
reporter opens the widget — for example, in the same place your app applies a
language change.
MakeThisBetter.setLocale('zh-CN')
Identity Verification
Identity verification links feedback to authenticated users and lets them view their own submissions on the feedback board.
Level 0 -- Anonymous (default): No user token. Feedback is anonymous.
MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_xxx' })
Anonymous reporters are offered a follow-up: the success card shows an optional
email field, and an address entered there is sent to the reporter endpoint and
kept in localStorage under mtb_reporter_email so the field is not asked for
again on later reports from the same browser. The field is skipped entirely when
user is set or when a JWT already identifies the reporter. Clearing site data
clears it.
Level 1 -- Static token: Pass a pre-generated JWT. Simple, but the token may expire during long sessions.
MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_xxx', userToken: 'eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIs...', })
Level 2 -- Dynamic token (recommended): Pass an async function that returns a fresh JWT. The SDK calls it before each API request, so tokens never go stale.
MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_xxx', userTokenFn: async () => { const res = await fetch('/api/mtb-token') const { token } = await res.json() return token }, })
When userToken or userTokenFn is set, the widget sends an X-User-Token header with every request. After a successful submission, a "View my feedback" link appears that opens the project board filtered to the user's submissions.
The JWT wins over user. These are not two independent ways to name the
reporter. Whenever the server receives a valid token, it takes the reporter's id,
email and name from the token's sub, email and name claims and discards the
user fields the widget sent alongside them — a claim you leave out is simply not
recorded, even if user carried it. Put everything you want attributed in the
token, and treat user as the anonymous-only path.
Generate tokens server-side using your project's Signing Secret (available in your project settings):
# Rails example payload = { sub: current_user.id, email: current_user.email, name: current_user.name, exp: 1.hour.from_now.to_i, } JWT.encode(payload, project.signing_secret, 'HS256')
Conditional Loading
// Only show to beta users if (user.isBetaTester) { MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_xxx', user: { id: user.id } }) }
Self-Hosting
The Widget works with any backend — not just makethisbetter.dev. Implement the
Submission Session profile you need from the
Self-Hosting API Specification,
then point apiUrl at your API version root:
MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'your-key', apiUrl: 'https://feedback.yoursite.com/api/v1', })
The minimum backend supports the Submission Session flow: create a Session with multipart context, optionally clarify it with the in-memory Submission Token, then explicitly finalize or abandon it. The Widget takes care of annotation, Interaction Replay, frustration detection, and context collection. Anonymous board handoff and post-submit email capture use two additional optional operations documented in the specification.
The cloud platform at makethisbetter.dev adds AI triage, dashboard, GitHub/Linear sync, and email notifications on top.
Content Security Policy
If your site sends a Content-Security-Policy header, three directives can
affect the widget.
script-src. The npm build ships inside your own bundle and needs no entry
of its own. The CDN build loads from unpkg:
script-src https://unpkg.com;
Interaction Replay loads the rrweb recorder on demand. The SDK first tries a
dynamic import('@rrweb/record') — when your bundler resolved that dependency,
the recorder is part of your own assets and nothing changes. When that import
is unavailable (the CDN build, or a bundler that externalized it), the SDK
injects a version-pinned, SRI-checked script from jsDelivr:
script-src https://cdn.jsdelivr.net;
The injected tag carries a sha384 integrity attribute and
crossorigin="anonymous", so the browser refuses to run the file if the CDN
content ever changes; the exact hash is pinned in the source next to the URL.
Because the tag is created by script, adding that hash to script-src does not
allowlist it — either allow the cdn.jsdelivr.net host, or use
'strict-dynamic' with a nonce on the widget's own script tag so trust
propagates to scripts it creates.
When script-src blocks the recorder, nothing on your page breaks: the
replay cannot start, the SDK logs
[MakeThisBetter] Interaction replay unavailable, falling back to markup, and
the toolbar switches back to Markup mode. Annotation, screenshots, and text
feedback are unaffected.
connect-src. Submissions go to https://makethisbetter.dev by default,
or to the origin of your apiUrl when self-hosting:
connect-src https://makethisbetter.dev;
style-src. The widget injects one <style> element into its own shadow
root and never touches your page's stylesheets. Browsers still evaluate the
page's CSP for elements inside a shadow root, so a style-src that forbids
'unsafe-inline' can leave the widget unstyled. Browser behavior inside shadow
roots has varied between engines and versions — if you run a strict
style-src, open the widget once and check.
Avoiding the rrweb CDN entirely
An allowlist that cannot add jsDelivr can serve the recorder from its own
origin instead. Before injecting the CDN script, the loader checks for an
existing window.rrwebRecord global and uses it as-is:
curl -o public/vendor/rrweb-record.min.js \ https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/@rrweb/record@2.1.0/umd/record.min.js
<script src="/vendor/rrweb-record.min.js"></script> <script src="https://unpkg.com/makethisbetter@1"></script> <script> MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_YOUR_KEY' }) </script>
No SDK configuration is needed — the pre-loaded global wins and the CDN is
never contacted. Keep the file at the version the SDK pins
(@rrweb/record@2.1.0), because the replay privacy filter is written against
that recorder's event shape.
Iframes
The widget scopes itself to the document it was initialized in: it positions against that frame's viewport and reports that frame's URL, DOM, and interactions. Install it in the frame whose UI you want feedback on. Capturing across frame boundaries — a parent page recording an embedded iframe, or the reverse — is not supported.
API
import { MakeThisBetter } from 'makethisbetter' // Start the widget MakeThisBetter.init(config: MakeThisBetterConfig): void // Remove the widget and clean up all listeners MakeThisBetter.destroy(): void // Open annotation mode from your own UI. Idempotent while already open. MakeThisBetter.open(): void // Close annotation mode and restore the page MakeThisBetter.close(): void // Show or remove the docked tab on non-touch devices without tearing down MakeThisBetter.showLauncher(): void MakeThisBetter.hideLauncher(): void // Switch the UI language for anything opened afterwards MakeThisBetter.setLocale(locale: string): void
Your own entry point
A tab docked to the edge of the screen is the right default, but it is not
always right — a full-screen editor, a map, or a phone where every pixel is
spoken for. Set entryMode: 'api' to render no tab at all and open the widget
from wherever the entry point belongs in your product:
MakeThisBetter.init({ projectKey: 'mtb_proj_xxx', entryMode: 'api' }) document.querySelector('#menu-feedback') .addEventListener('click', () => MakeThisBetter.open())
In api mode nothing is reachable until you wire up that call, so the widget
logs a warning on init as a reminder. On non-touch devices, showLauncher() can
bring the docked tab back at runtime. Touch devices never render the SDK tab;
put the entry in your own mobile UI and call MakeThisBetter.open() from it.
Architecture
The widget runs inside a Shadow DOM container, isolating its styles from your page. No CSS conflicts, no z-index wars.
Shadow DOM Host (#mtb-widget-host)
+-- Feedback Tab (entry point)
+-- Annotation Toolbar (Mark up / Replay toggle)
+-- Annotation Session (pin + draw overlays)
+-- Comment Popup (description + submit)
+-- AI Clarification Card (follow-up conversation)
+-- Success Card (confirmation)
+-- Frustration Prompt (proactive trigger)
Bundle Size
| Format | Size | gzip |
|---|---|---|
IIFE (makethisbetter.js) |
~160 KB | ~44 KB |
ESM (makethisbetter.esm.js) |
~187 KB | ~49 KB |
CJS (makethisbetter.cjs) |
~146 KB | ~39 KB |
Screenshot chunk (html-to-image.js / .cjs) |
~17 KB / ~14 KB | ~6 KB / ~5 KB |
Standalone ESM (makethisbetter.standalone.js) |
~205 KB | ~55 KB |
The ESM and CJS bundles load the screenshot renderer (html-to-image) on demand from the sibling chunk the first time a capture path warms up, so sessions that never open the widget skip its weight; bundlers split it into the consumer's own chunks the same way. The IIFE bundle keeps it inlined — classic-script pages get exactly one file, and its size includes the renderer.
Copying a single file out of dist/ by path — Rails importmap downloads,
self-hosting, vendoring into a repo — must use the standalone ESM build
(dist/makethisbetter.standalone.js, also exported as
makethisbetter/standalone): it inlines the screenshot chunk so it survives
being served under a digested or relocated filename. Vendoring the split ESM
file alone leaves its relative ./html-to-image.js import unresolvable and
screenshot capture silently degrades to text-only feedback. The rrweb recorder (~78 KB) is loaded on demand when
Interaction Replay starts and is not included in these numbers.
Development
git clone https://github.com/makethisbetter/makethisbetter-js.git cd makethisbetter-js npm install npm run dev # Dev server at localhost:5173 npm run build # Build all formats to dist/ npm test # Run tests npm run type-check # TypeScript validation
Related
| Package | What it does |
|---|---|
| Make This Better | The platform — dashboard, AI triage, feedback board |
| @makethisbetter/mcp | MCP server — your coding agent reads feedback directly |
| makethisbetter CLI | Terminal tool for managing feedback |
| makethisbetter Skills | Claude Code skills — /makethisbetter in your editor |
License
GitHub repo settings
- Description: Drop-in widget for AI-powered user feedback and automated fixes
- Homepage: https://makethisbetter.dev
- Topics: feedback, widget, ai, mcp, claude-code, cursor, vibe-coding