qryptchat

qc

qrypt.chat in your terminal: a full-screen, end-to-end encrypted chat client, a scriptable CLI and an MCP server, all in one command.

curl -fsSL https://qrypt.chat/install.sh | sh
qc

The installer puts qc (and its alias qryptchat) under ~/.local, never asks for sudo, and fetches a private official Node if this machine has no Node 22+. Run it again to update; remove with sh ~/.local/share/qryptchat/uninstall.sh. Or install it with a package manager: npm install -g @profullstack/qryptchat (or bun add -g @profullstack/qryptchat).

The first run signs you in through your browser, then opens your chats.

The client

 🔒 qrypt.chat   @you                                                    ● live
┌ Chats ──────────┐┌ alice ───────────────────────── 2 people · ML-KEM-1024 ┐
│▸ alice        2 ││ ───────────────────── Tue 6 Oct ─────────────────────  │
│  team chat      ││ alice  14:02                                           │
│  ops            ││   shipped it 🚀                                        │
│                 ││ you  14:03                                             │
│                 ││   🔥🔥                                                 │
│                 ││ alice is typing…                                       │
│                 ││  Message alice  (Ctrl+E emoji, :rocket: works too)     │
└─────────────────┘└────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
 ENTER send  CTRL+E emoji  TAB chats  PGUP scroll  CTRL+C quit

Key	Does
Enter	send (or open the highlighted chat)
Ctrl+E	the emoji picker: search, recents and every group, drawn with OpenEmoji
:rocket:	shortcodes turn into emoji when you send
Tab / Esc	move between the chat list and the composer
Ctrl+N / Ctrl+P	next / previous chat
PgUp / PgDn, wheel	scroll back through the conversation
Ctrl+R	reload
Ctrl+C	quit

The mouse works too: click a chat, scroll the transcript, click an emoji. Unread counts, typing indicators and new messages arrive live.

Scripts and agents

qc chats                        # id and name of every chat
qc read alice -n 20             # the last 20 messages, decrypted
qc send alice "on my way"       # encrypted to every participant
echo "deploy done" | qc send ops -
qc listen --json                # new messages as NDJSON, until you stop it
qc whoami

<chat> is a chat id or any unique part of its name. Add --json for machine output.

MCP

qc mcp

runs an MCP server on stdio with three tools: list_chats, read_chat and send_message. Encryption and decryption happen on this machine; the server only ever sees ciphertext. For Claude Code:

claude mcp add qryptchat -- qc mcp

Signing in

qc login uses OAuth 2.1 (authorization code + PKCE), started from the terminal:

1. qc opens qrypt.chat/cli/authorize with a one-time ML-KEM-1024 public key and prints a confirmation code.
2. You check the browser shows the same code, then approve.
3. The browser seals your keys to that one-time key, and qc receives them plus a session of its own. The server only relays ciphertext.

Over SSH, qc login --oob shows a code in the browser for you to paste instead of redirecting back.

Your keys and tokens are never stored in plaintext. ~/.config/qc/session.json (or $QC_HOME) keeps only your username and the server URL in the clear. Everything else is sealed with ChaCha20-Poly1305 under a key from:

• your OS keychain (macOS Keychain, or libsecret's secret-tool on a Linux desktop), so you're never asked; or
• a passphrase, stretched with scrypt. qc asks for it once per run; scripts and qc mcp read it from QC_PASSPHRASE.

Sessions refresh themselves and are re-sealed each time. qc logout deletes them. Point at another server with --url or QC_URL.

Licence

MIT. Emoji: OpenEmoji by Profullstack, Inc. (CC BY 4.0).