Run the chat in Improve on your own Anthropic key

The chat in the Improve panel runs on this Mac unless you choose otherwise. With your own Anthropic key it can run on Claude instead, which can make more kinds of change. This needs macOS 27.

This is not the same as connecting the Claude app to Rooster. That lets the Claude app edit your projects from its own window, and is set up in the same tab, under the AI apps.

Choose Claude

1. Choose Rooster > Settings and choose AI.
2. Under The chat in Improve, choose Claude, with your Anthropic key.
3. Paste your key in the field. If you don't have one, Get a key opens the API keys page of Anthropic's Claude Console.
4. Press Connect, or Return.

Rooster checks the key with Anthropic before it keeps it, and says if the key was not accepted or Anthropic could not be reached. Until a key is connected, the chat runs on this Mac.

The engine's name sits under the field you type in: On this Mac, or Claude. Click it to open this tab.

What each ask sends

Each ask goes from Rooster straight to Anthropic, under your key. No Rooster server is in the way, and Rooster counts nothing. It sends:

• what you typed, and the words you attached;
• Rooster's instructions and a description of the changes it can make;
• a short sheet of facts about the project: its title, its scenes, zooms and graphics with the words under each, its speakers and whether captions are on;
• the sentences of the script a search found, and up to three passages of Rooster's help;
• Rooster's own summary of the last few turns of the chat.

It never sends your recording, its sound, a frame, the whole transcript, a file path, your licence or anything that identifies you or your Mac.

Like any app, each request also carries a User-Agent: the name and version of Anthropic's Swift package, ClaudeForFoundationModels; Rooster's identifier and version, which says whether you downloaded Rooster or got it from the App Store; the Swift version; and your macOS version. It is the same for every copy of a release, so it names the app and the macOS release, not you. Anthropic also sees your Mac's IP address, as any website does.

Connect's check sends your key and asks Anthropic for one model's name - nothing from your projects. macOS adds its usual headers to that one request: a User-Agent naming the app and its build number with the versions of macOS's networking parts, and the languages your Mac is set to prefer.

How Anthropic handles what it is sent is set by Anthropic's own terms - for a key made in its Console, its commercial terms. Settings links to them.

What it costs

Anthropic bills each ask to your key. On 12 November 2026 an ask cost about 3 US cents. Rooster sets no budget, so set one yourself: in Anthropic's Claude Console, open Spend limits and press Set limit or Adjust limit beside Monthly spend limit.

Edits wait for you

On Claude, every change the chat makes is proposed: nothing in the video moves until you press Apply, and one Undo takes it back.

When Claude can't answer

The chat on this Mac answers instead, and the reply says why, once in a chat:

• Claude didn't accept your key. Press Open Settings under the line to check it.
• Your Anthropic account is out of credit.
• Claude is busy right now.
• Claude couldn't be reached - you are offline, or it took too long.
• Claude couldn't answer that.

Rooster never switches you back to This Mac on its own. If Apple Intelligence is off, the reply says the chat on this Mac can't answer either.

Projects kept out of AI apps

A project you keep out with Keep Out of AI Apps always runs its chat on this Mac. The name under the field says so.

Stop, or remove the key

• Choose This Mac to stop sending at once. Rooster keeps your key, so you can switch back without pasting it.
• Press Remove Key to delete it. The chat then runs on this Mac until you connect a key again.

The key is kept in your login keychain, never in Rooster's files. It is never synced to iCloud, though Migration Assistant carries it to a new Mac.