CLI commands

Reference for the Hive CLI, verified against the shipped command tree.

Commands are grouped under tools, auth, config, and keys. Run hive --help for the list on your installed version, or hive <group> --help for one group.

Most commands accept --json for machine-readable output, which is what you want in scripts.

Setup

Command	What it does
hive init	Interactive per-client MCP setup
hive init --all --browser	Configure every detected client, with browser sign-in
hive setup [client]	Set up one client, for example hive setup cursor
hive doctor	Check API key, endpoint reachability, tool catalog, and updates
hive upgrade	Update the CLI
hive uninstall	Remove Hive configuration

Tools

Discovery and execution live under hive tools:

Command	What it does
hive tools list	List registered tools. Accepts --category, --provider, --limit, --offset
hive tools search <query>	Search tools by name or description
hive tools info <name>	Show a tool’s schema and description
hive tools call <name> --args '<json>'	Execute a tool. Arguments can also be piped as JSON on stdin

Authentication

Command	What it does
hive auth login	Browser sign-in. --manual pastes a key instead
hive auth logout	Remove stored credentials
hive auth whoami	Show the current profile
hive auth signup	Create a Hive account and get a key
hive auth profiles	List profiles
hive auth switch <name>	Switch the active profile

Every auth command takes --profile <name> if you keep more than one account.

Keys

Command	What it does
hive keys list	List keys on your account
hive keys create	Create a key. The secret prints once
hive keys revoke <id>	Disable a key

Client configuration

hive config prints config for a client rather than writing it, which is useful when you want to paste it yourself or check what setup would do:

Command	What it does
hive config claude-desktop	Print Claude Desktop config JSON
hive config claude-code	Print Claude Code config
hive config cursor	Print Cursor config JSON
hive config vscode	Print VS Code config JSON
hive config codex	Print Codex config
hive config grok	Print Grok config
hive config http [url]	Print remote HTTP connection instructions

Other

Command	What it does
hive serve	Run Hive as a local stdio MCP server
hive alias set <name> <command>	Save a shorthand for a call you run often
hive completion <shell>	Generate shell completions

serve is for clients that only speak stdio, or for local development against your own provider keys. Most users should connect to the hosted endpoint instead.

Scripting

--json gives output you can pipe:

hive tools call get_token_price --args '{"token":"ETH"}' --json

The envelope has ok, data, and meta, where meta carries the tool name, provider, and runtime status.

Useful global flags:

Flag	What it does
--json	Machine-readable envelope
--jq <filter>	Filter data without piping to an external tool
--fields <list>	Keep only the named fields
--csv	CSV output when data is an array
--quiet	Suppress the human-readable status line

Exit codes are stable, so hive doctor works as a health check in CI.