rea

[!IMPORTANT]
Get REA from morluto/rea,
rea.tools, or the rea-agents npm package.
Follow the installation and release links from these official sources. A similar
repository name or copied README does not establish that a download is official.

Join the Reverse Engineering Community Discord · Q&A · Show and Tell

See a feature in an app that you want in your own product? Ask your agent to investigate it with REA. It can inspect the app without its source code, explain how the feature works, show the evidence, and build a version for your project.

REA connects your agent to tools for inspecting native binaries, JavaScript and Electron apps, .NET assemblies, and websites. You can also use the same tools from your terminal. Analysis runs locally, and results include the evidence and limitations behind each conclusion.

Setup registers REA with your agent and installs matching workflow instructions. Native analysis can use an existing Hopper, Ghidra, or IDA installation; setup can optionally install Hopper with approval. Static JavaScript analysis needs no native analysis engine.

Visit the REA website for setup instructions, illustrated guides, and real case studies.

Quick start

On Linux, Ghidra, JADX, firmware tool launches and static JavaScript/Electron
analysis require a procps-compatible ps on REA's PATH for process ownership
checks. Recovery steps are in docs/installation.md under
"Linux owned-process prerequisite".

Set up your agent

With Node.js and npm installed, run:

npx rea-agents setup

Choose your agents, review the proposed changes, and approve them. Setup adds
REA's MCP server and matching workflow instructions, with backups of existing
configuration. Restart your agent afterward.

Setup supports Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Gemini CLI, Grok Build and
other agents. See
installation and setup for provider configuration and
manual MCP registration.

MCP uses compact input schemas by default to reduce context overhead. Set
REA_MCP_INPUT_SCHEMA_PROFILE=full in your MCP registration when you need the
complete advertised field guidance and nested validation details. Both profiles
keep the full tool set and canonical server validation. See
"Compact input schema profile" in the MCP contracts guide.

Ask your agent

Understand how search works in the Notes app, show me the evidence, and build a
similar feature for my project.

Replace Notes with your target app and the feature you want to understand.

Use the terminal

Inspect an extracted JavaScript/Electron app directory or ASAR:

npx -y rea-agents@latest analyze-javascript-application /absolute/path/to/app --json

The result includes modules, imports, Electron boundaries and their evidence.
Replace the path with your target, such as "D:/apps/example" on Windows.

To install the rea command for regular use:

npm install --global rea-agents
rea --help

For native analysis, configure a provider first. See the
CLI and Evidence guide for native commands, provider selection,
snapshots and scripting.

Update REA

REA changes quickly, and new releases include frequent bug fixes. Keep your
installation up to date.

For a CLI installed with npm install --global or bun add --global:

rea update

rea --update is an alias for this verified workflow and accepts the same global
output flags. Use rea update when combining it with other command controls.

Updater commands retain at most 4 MiB of stdout and stderr combined. Oversized
metadata replies are rejected after the command exits; verbose installs continue
with bounded diagnostics. Human progress output respects terminal backpressure
and waits for submitted writes to finish.

Bun global updates require Bun 1.2.17 or later. With an older Bun release,
upgrade Bun manually before running rea update.

To refresh your agent registrations and skill, run the setup command printed
by the update.

If you use npx, update your agent setup with:

npx rea-agents@latest setup

Review the setup changes and restart your agent. For one-off CLI commands,
use npx rea-agents@latest followed by the command. With Bun, use
bunx rea-agents@latest in place of npx rea-agents@latest.

How REA works

Your agent calls REA through MCP to inspect the target and trace relevant code.
REA returns findings with their evidence. The agent uses them to ask follow-up
questions, explain the behavior, or write and test an implementation.
CLI commands use the same workflows.

Open the full-size figure.

What you can analyze

REA requires Node.js 22.x (>=22.19), 24.x (>=24.11), or 26+, plus npm.
Additional tools and host support depend on the target:

Static JavaScript and .NET inspection read the supplied files without running
the application. Runtime capture runs or interacts with the selected target
using your user permissions; each runtime guide describes its effects.

For offline native-binary inspection, REA also supports caller-supplied GNU
objdump and Rizin. See the reverse-engineering tools guide
for provider setup, CLI commands, and Evidence limitations. REA does not install
or update either provider.

Native formats and host support vary by provider. See
Hopper and Ghidra setup, the
IDA guide (including an optional native MCP bridge), the
Kuna decompiler guide, and
experimental Windows Ghidra support.
Ghidra also supports 16-bit DOS analysis.
For large binaries, raise the provider's startup deadline with
REA_GHIDRA_STARTUP_TIMEOUT_MS or REA_HOPPER_STARTUP_TIMEOUT_MS.
For provider selection, see the CLI guide.
Check release availability
for features added since the latest npm release.

Showcases

DX-Ball: reconstruct a sound-pan calculation

Follow a sound call into its position-to-pan helper, inspect the instructions,
and turn incomplete pseudocode into C. The reconstruction passes 3,205
original-x86 cases and reproduces all 63 compiled function bytes.

Read the case study ·
Reconstruction repository

Notion: trace the Electron clipboard bridge

Find the renderer's clipboard API, follow it through preload and IPC into the
main process, and inspect the rich clipboard format.

Read the case study

TH04: recover a DOS bullet-ring calculation

Inspect the original PC-98 game's 16-bit instructions, recover the fixed and
aimed angle calculations, and compare the reconstructed C++ with the
historical compiler output.

Read the case study ·
Reconstruction repository

If you've used REA on something interesting, we'd love to see it. Share your
case in an issue or a
pull request, including the target,
your question, how REA helped, and what you found.

FAQ

rea update

npx rea-agents@latest setup

Documentation

Start with the website's worked guides.
For exact options, prerequisites and result contracts:

• Installation and setup: agent registration, provider configuration, updates and uninstall.
• Readiness and troubleshooting: diagnose one agent or analysis engine.
• CLI and Evidence: commands, provider selection, snapshots, import/export and exit statuses.
• MCP contracts and agent prompts: tool results, sessions and guided investigations.
• Tool catalog: generated inventory of tools, providers and CLI commands.
• Roadmap: planned work and capability trackers.

Report vulnerabilities through SECURITY.md.

Star history

🎉 300,000 GitHub stars — thank you!

Thanks to everyone using REA, reporting bugs, requesting features, testing builds, and contributing fixes.

Disclaimer

See DISCLAIMER.md for responsible-use guidance.

The project's position on illegal or unauthorized use covers all REA versions,
distribution channels, and platforms; each copy retains its applicable licenses.

REA is for lawful research, education, interoperability, software preservation,
and analysis of software you own or are authorized to examine.

Contributing

We'd love your help with REA! Open an issue to
report a bug or suggest a feature, or send a pull request
to improve the code or docs.

See CONTRIBUTING.md for development setup and checks,
testing for verification lanes, and the
architecture map for the project structure.

License

MIT

REA-authored code is licensed under MIT. Third-party material retains its own
licenses and copyright notices; see
Third-party notices for the dependency inventory,
preserved license texts, and external-tool terms.

You must legally obtain and be authorized to use commercial tools, including
IDA Pro / Hex-Rays decompilers, Hopper, and JEB, under their applicable
licenses. REA grants no tool license, key, or activation entitlement. Trials and
demos remain subject to vendor terms, including user, feature, automation, and
output sharing restrictions. Cracked copies, stolen keys, unauthorized key
sharing, and bypassing license restrictions are not authorized. This guidance
does not amend MIT or third-party licenses.