USB Cam Preview
Live: https://usbcam.bosansky.com · FAQ
A webcam, USB microscope and USB endoscope viewer that runs entirely in your browser.
Nothing is installed and nothing is uploaded.
- Live view from any UVC camera, with resolution choice and hardware controls where the browser exposes them
- Filters from a menu: black & white, sepia, negative, two-tone, false color, edge detection, plus
brightness, contrast, saturation, gamma and hue
- Rotate, mirror, zoom and pan, crosshair and grid overlays, freeze frame
- Photos (PNG/JPEG) and video (MP4 in Chrome/Edge/Safari, WebM in Firefox), optionally saved
straight into a folder (Chrome/Edge)
- Camera profiles: cameras are recognised by USB ID and opened with settings that suit them
- Thermal cameras (InfiRay family: TOOLTOP T256, Topdon TC001, InfiRay P2 Pro): palettes, automatic
or fixed color range, temperatures (center, hottest and coldest point, under the pointer, CSV
export) and photos with the temperatures and a legend drawn in, in Chrome, Edge and Firefox.
Cameras without their own profile can use the camera type "Generic thermal camera (InfiRay format)"
- Compatibility test: measures what the connected camera really delivers and shows which
profiles fit it, then produces a report for adding the camera to the project
Keyboard: Space photo, R record, F freeze. Mouse wheel zooms, drag pans, double-click resets.
Run locally
npm run dev
Open http://localhost:8080. Requires Node 18+, nothing to install.
Browser support
| Chrome / Edge | Firefox | Safari |
|---|
| Live view, filters, photos | yes | yes | yes |
| Video recording | MP4 | WebM | MP4 |
| Cameras recognised automatically (USB ID) | yes | no: pick the camera type by hand | no: pick the camera type by hand |
| Native vs scaled resolutions in the test | yes | no | no |
| Thermal camera temperatures | yes | yes (camera type picked by hand) | not tested with a real camera |
| Hardware controls (exposure, focus, …) | if the camera offers them | no | no |
| Save straight to a folder | yes | no (download) | no (download) |
Tested on macOS 26 with an endoscope, a USB microscope, a thermal camera and a Logitech webcam:
Chrome 155 and Firefox 156 with the real cameras; Safari 26 only with its built-in test cameras
(Safari's automation replaces real cameras with mock ones), so real cameras in Safari still need a
manual check. On macOS, Chrome exposed no hardware controls for any of the USB cameras.
macOS asks once per browser whether it may use the camera (System Settings → Privacy & Security →
Camera); until that is allowed, the camera opens but sends no image, and the app says so.
Phones. On Android (Chrome 155, Galaxy S23, Android 16) the phone's own cameras work,
including hardware controls (exposure, white balance, focus, ISO, zoom); big pictures are recorded
as video at up to 1920×1080. USB cameras plugged into that phone through a hub showed up on its
USB bus but Android did not offer them to apps (no external-camera support on that model); Chrome,
Samsung Internet and Firefox all listed only the four built-in cameras, also with a camera plugged
straight into the phone. Every Android browser takes cameras from Android, so whether USB cameras
work depends on the phone (Google lists USB camera support for Pixel 6 and later). When a USB
camera is plugged in, Android may ask which app should open it: browsers are never on that list,
and the choice does not affect them. iPhone cannot use USB cameras at all;
the layout was checked in Safari on an iPhone simulator. iPad with USB-C and iPadOS 17+ may work
but is untested.
WiFi endoscopes that need a phone app do not work: they are not USB video devices.
If a USB camera does not show up at all, try a USB hub (ideally powered): some cheap cameras fail
to connect straight to a laptop's port. A camera's profile says so when this is known.
Deploy to Cloudflare Pages
Connect the repository and use:
- Build command:
npm run build (validates everything and writes the generated lists of cameras,
drivers and filters)
- Build output directory:
public
The live site, https://usbcam.bosansky.com, is a Cloudflare Pages project built this way from the
main branch, with usbcam.bosansky.com as its custom domain.
public/_headers sets a camera-only permissions policy.
Extending
Everything camera- or filter-specific lives outside the core, one file or folder each:
| |
|---|
public/cameras/<id>.json | one camera model (a profile) |
public/drivers/<id>/ | one camera type that needs code, e.g. thermal cameras (guide) |
public/filters/<id>.js | one image filter (guide) |
The app finds them on its own; npm run check validates them and npm test runs their tests.
Supported cameras
See public/cameras/. To add yours, see CONTRIBUTING.md; AI agents follow AGENTS.md.
