grok-cli-self

The lightweight, zero-dependency Grok CLI — chat with xAI's Grok AI directly from your terminal

One-shot prompts · Interactive chat · Streaming replies · Pipe anything in · macOS, Linux & Windows

= 18">

Installation · Quick Start · Usage · For Developers · FAQ · Contributing

🤖 What is grok-cli-self?

grok-cli-self is a free, open-source command-line interface (CLI) for Grok, the AI assistant built by xAI. It brings the power of Grok's large language models — including the latest Grok 4 family — straight into your terminal, so you can ask questions, generate code, explain errors, draft text, and automate AI workflows without ever leaving your shell.

If you're searching for a Grok CLI, a Grok command-line tool, a way to use Grok in the terminal, or a self-hosted Grok chat client that you fully control — this is it. No Electron, no browser tab, no telemetry, no bloat: one small Node.js program, zero runtime dependencies, and your own xAI API key.

⚠️ Disclaimer: grok-cli-self is a community project and is not an official xAI product. "Grok" and "xAI" are trademarks of xAI Corp. This tool simply talks to the official, public xAI API using your own key.

✨ Features

• ⚡ Blazing fast startup — pure Node.js, zero dependencies, installs in seconds
• 💬 Interactive chat mode — a friendly REPL with conversation memory, slash commands and multi-line input
• 🎯 One-shot mode — grokself "your question" prints the answer and exits; perfect for scripts
• 🌊 Real-time streaming — watch Grok's reply appear token by token
• 🔀 Pipe anything in — cat error.log | grokself "what's wrong here?" — the Unix way
• 🧠 Model switching — use grok-4-latest, grok-code-fast-1, or any model your key can access
• 🔐 Private by design — your API key lives in ~/.grokself/config.json (chmod 600) and is sent only to api.x.ai
• 🛠️ Scriptable & CI-friendly — --no-stream, exit codes, env vars (XAI_API_KEY, GROK_BASE_URL, GROK_MODEL)
• 🍎 Runs anywhere Node 18+ runs — macOS (Apple Silicon & Intel), Linux, Windows (PowerShell / Git Bash / WSL)

🚀 Installation

⚡ macOS — 3-line quick install

Open Terminal (press ⌘ + Space, type Terminal, hit Enter) and run these three lines, one at a time:

1. Install Apple's command line tools (needed by git & compilers)

xcode-select --install

2. Install Node.js + npm via nvm — see https://nodejs.org/en/download

curl -o- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvm-sh/nvm/v0.40.3/install.sh | bash && source ~/.zshrc && nvm install --lts

3. Install grok-cli-self straight from GitHub

mkdir -p 'grokself' && cd 'grokself' && npm install github:PointAntStorm/grok-self

Then run it:

npx grokself setup          # paste your xAI API key once
npx grokself "hello Grok!"  # 🎉 you're chatting with Grok in your terminal

🐧 Linux / 🪟 Windows

# Install Node.js 18+ from https://nodejs.org/en/download (nvm / fnm / official installer)
mkdir -p 'grokself' && cd 'grokself' && npm install github:PointAntStorm/grok-self
npx grokself setup
npx grokself "hello Grok!"

🌍 Optional: install globally

If you want the grokself command available everywhere (not just inside the grokself folder):

npm install -g github:PointAntStorm/grok-self
grokself "hello Grok!"   # works from any directory now

🧒 Never used a terminal before? (Beginner-friendly guide)

No worries — follow these steps exactly and you'll be chatting with Grok in ~5 minutes. No programming knowledge and no Homebrew needed.

Step 1 — Open the Terminal app. On your Mac, press ⌘ (Command) + Space, type Terminal, and press Enter. A white or black window with text appears. This is where you "talk" to your computer by typing commands.

Step 2 — Install Apple's developer tools. Copy this line, paste it into Terminal (with ⌘ + V), and press Enter:

xcode-select --install

A popup appears → click Install and wait for it to finish. If it says they're already installed, that's fine — move on.

Step 3 — Install Node.js (which includes npm). npm is the tool that downloads grok-cli-self. The easiest way to get it without Homebrew is nvm (Node Version Manager):

1. Open https://nodejs.org/en/download in your browser.

2. Choose the nvm install method shown on that page — it gives you one command to copy.

3. Paste that command into Terminal and press Enter. It looks like this:

   curl -o- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvm-sh/nvm/v0.40.3/install.sh | bash
   

4. Then copy-paste these two lines (they load nvm and install the long-term-support version of Node):

   source ~/.zshrc
   nvm install --lts
   

5. Check it worked — type node -v and press Enter. You should see something like v22.x.x. ✅

Step 4 — Install grok-cli-self. Copy-paste this whole line and press Enter:

mkdir -p 'grokself' && cd 'grokself' && npm install github:PointAntStorm/grok-self

This creates a folder called grokself in your home directory and downloads the tool into it.

Step 5 — Get your Grok API key. Grok's brain lives in xAI's cloud, and the key is your personal password to use it:

1. Go to https://console.x.ai and sign in (you can use your X/Twitter account).
2. Click API Keys → Create API key.
3. Copy the key — it starts with xai-. Keep it secret, like a password.

Step 6 — Save the key and start chatting!

npx grokself setup

Paste your key when asked and press Enter. Then:

npx grokself "Explain quantum computing like I'm five"

🎉 Done! From now on, whenever you want to chat, open Terminal, type cd ~/grokself, then npx grokself for chat mode or npx grokself "your question" for a quick answer.

⚡ Quick Start

# One-shot question (streams the answer)
grokself "Write a haiku about terminals"

# Interactive chat with memory
grokself

# Pipe in context — logs, code, diffs, anything
cat server.log | grokself "Find the root cause of this crash"
git diff | grokself "Review this diff like a senior engineer"

# Pick a different model for one command
grokself --model grok-code-fast-1 "Refactor this function: ..."

# Non-interactive output for scripts & CI
grokself --no-stream "Summarize: ..." > summary.txt

Example session

$ grokself "Why is my zsh slow to start?"

grok › The most common cause is a heavy ~/.zshrc — usually a plugin
manager or nvm loading synchronously. Try timing it:

  time zsh -i -c exit

If nvm is the culprit, lazy-load it or move to a faster manager…

📖 Usage

Commands

Options

Interactive mode (REPL) slash commands

Environment variables

Configuration file

Settings are stored at ~/.grokself/config.json (permissions 600 — only you can read it):

{
  "apiKey": "xai-...",
  "model": "grok-4-latest",
  "baseUrl": "https://api.x.ai/v1",
  "temperature": 0.7
}

🆚 Why grok-cli-self?

grok-cli-self doesn't try to be an autonomous coding agent — it's the **fastest way to talk to Grok from