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Show HN: Pristine – an agent skill that critiques and polishes web UI

Developer maddhruv released Pristine, an open-source agent skill that critiques and polishes web UI, distributed via a plugin marketplace and installable with `npx skills add maddhruv/pristine` for Claude Code, Codex, GitHub Copilot, Cursor and any agent that reads `SKILL.md`. Pristine scores a page out of 10 across 11 Dimensions through defined Personas and offers four commands — `/pristine init`, `/pristine critique`, `/pristine design` and `/pristine polish` — with 16 named Lenses such as bolder, typeset and harden; the author reports one `/pristine polish` run moving a page from 3.5/10 to 9.5/10 across eight published before/after pairs. The skill captures pages in light and dark, desktop and mobile using a browser tool the agent already has or a bundled `scripts/capture.mjs` that installs a private Playwright Chromium into `~/.cache/pristine-capture`, requiring Node 18+ for the bundled scripts.

read2 min views5 publishedOct 23, 2026
Show HN: Pristine – an agent skill that critiques and polishes web UI
Image: Michielbdejong (auto-discovered)

An agent skill that makes web UI pristine. It looks at the real page (light and dark, desktop and mobile), judges it through the eyes of the people who use your product, and either scores it honestly or fixes it.

Works with Claude Code, Codex, GitHub Copilot, Cursor and any agent that reads SKILL.md.

Site and examples: https://pristine-ui.pages.dev

Before (3.5/10) After one /pristine polish (9.5/10)

Eight real before/after pairs, with the full critique and every change: https://pristine-ui.pages.dev/#examples

Command What it does Edits code
/pristine init Reads your code, asks only what it can't see, and writes DESIGN.md : product, Personas, brand, design system. yes
/pristine critique <target> Scores a page out of 10 across 11 Dimensions, through each Persona, with the exact fix for every finding. no
/pristine design <brief> Builds a new page, component or flow, or redesigns one in a new direction. yes
/pristine polish [lenses] <target> Keeps the look and raises every detail. The default for a bare /pristine on existing UI. yes

A target can be a URL, a pasted screenshot, a file path or a feature name. Name Lenses after polish to force them, for example /pristine polish bolder typeset the hero. There are 16: bolder, colorize, typeset, quieter, decolorize, distill, layout, adapt, consistency, animate, delight, overdrive, clarify, harden, optimize, polish-details.

Full reference with examples: https://pristine-ui.pages.dev/docs/

/plugin marketplace add maddhruv/pristine
/plugin install pristine@pristine
codex plugin marketplace add maddhruv/pristine
codex plugin add pristine@pristine
copilot plugin marketplace add maddhruv/pristine
copilot plugin install pristine@pristine
npx skills add maddhruv/pristine
git clone https://github.com/maddhruv/pristine ~/pristine
ln -s ~/pristine/skills/pristine ~/.claude/skills/pristine   # or ~/.copilot/skills, ~/.agents/skills

Then, in your project, run /pristine init once and /pristine on whatever you're building.

Pristine captures pages before it judges them. It uses a browser tool your agent already has (Claude in Chrome, an agent browser, Playwright MCP). If there is none, scripts/capture.mjs installs a private Playwright Chromium into ~/.cache/pristine-capture on first run. Node 18+ is required for the bundled scripts.

skills/pristine/
  SKILL.md              entry point: commands, routing, non-negotiables
  agents/openai.yaml    display metadata for Codex
  reference/            one file per command, plus capture, craft floor
  reference/lenses/     the 16 Lenses
  reference/patterns/   landing pages, dashboards, onboarding, motion recipes, ...
  scripts/capture.mjs   light/dark x desktop/mobile screenshots, zoom, element capture
  scripts/detect.mjs    static scan for common UI defects
site/                   the showcase (Astro, Cloudflare Pages), built with Pristine
.claude-plugin/         plugin and marketplace manifests

See CONTRIBUTING.md and the Code of Conduct. Bug reports that include the session, the harness and the model are the most useful thing you can send.

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