Desktop App Starter

Desktop App Starter

A free starter for building desktop apps with Claude Code. Electron 41, React 19, TypeScript and
Tailwind 4, and it already runs.

Open the folder in Claude Code and ask for a screen in plain words. Claude reads CLAUDE.md first,
reuses the pieces that are already here, adds your feature the way the rest of the app is built, and
writes a test. It doesn't have to rebuild the window, the bridge, the settings or the components for
every new app.

MIT licensed. Use it for anything, including apps you sell.

Want license keys, code signing and auto-update too? That's the
full Desktop App Boilerplate,
also included in my course Build With AI 1.0.
See what's different.

What's inside

- The window. Title bar, sidebar and status bar. A new screen is one line in a registry.
- 6 themes. System, light, dark, slate, midnight and high contrast.
- Settings that persist, typed and checked with Zod.
- API key storage by the OS. Your key is encrypted with Electron safeStorage and never reaches the UI.
- Claude, ready to call. askClaude, streamClaude and askClaudeJson in the main process, on the
  official @anthropic-ai/sdk. The default model is Claude Opus 5.5.
- 21 ready components, plus 8 layout and 3 motion pieces: buttons, inputs, select, table, modal,
  confirm dialog, toasts, tabs, tooltips and more. They're all on the Components screen.
- Your files. File and folder pickers, drag and drop, and a file service that only touches what the
  user picked.
- A safe bridge. Main, preload and UI are split, and every message between them is typed and checked.
- Installer builds for Windows, Mac and Linux, wired in.
- CLAUDE.md. The rules Claude Code reads before it writes anything, so every screen lands in the
  same structure.
- Generators and checks. npm run…