grepai is a privacy-first CLI for semantic code search. It uses vector embeddings to understand code meaning, enabling natural language queries that find relevant code—even when naming conventions vary.
Drastically reduces AI agent input tokens by providing relevant context instead of raw search results.
Features
Search by intent — Ask "authentication logic" and find handleUserSession
Trace call graphs — Know who calls a function before you change it
— Your code never leaves your machine
developer-tools
embeddings
golang
mcp
privacy-first
semantic-search
vector-search
100% local
Always up-to-date — File watcher keeps the index fresh automatically
AI agent ready — Works with Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf out of the box
MCP server — Your AI agent can call grepai directly as a tool
Installation
Homebrew (macOS):
brew install yoanbernabeu/tap/grepai
Linux/macOS:
curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/yoanbernabeu/grepai/main/install.sh | sh
Requires an embedding provider — Ollama (default), LM Studio, or OpenAI.
Ollama (recommended):
ollama pull nomic-embed-text
Quick Start
grepai init # Initialize in your project
grepai watch # Start indexing daemon
grepai search "error handling" # Search semantically
grepai trace callers "Login" # Find who calls a function
What developers say
"I just hit my limit and it took 13% of my max5 plan just to read my codebase. I am very, very excited about your new tool."
— u/911pleasehold on r/ClaudeAI (280K+ views)
"It works great! Takes 5 minutes to install. Crazy!"
— [@LesSaleGeek](h...
