Installation and authentication

Install and upgrade

node --version
npm install -g @kittaai/cli
kitta --version
npm install -g @kittaai/cli@latest

Node.js 22+ is required. If kitta is not found after installation, check that npm's global executable directory is on PATH and reopen your terminal.

Interactive authentication

kitta auth login
kitta auth status --json
kitta auth logout

Login verifies the API key and stores it in the system keyring, without a plaintext credential fallback. Use an environment variable when a keyring is unavailable.

Headless environments

Inject KITTA_API_KEY using your runtime's secret manager. The following shows syntax only: YOUR_API_KEY is a placeholder. Do not put real secrets in shared scripts or shell history.

Bash

export KITTA_API_KEY="YOUR_API_KEY"
kitta auth status --json
unset KITTA_API_KEY

PowerShell

$env:KITTA_API_KEY = "YOUR_API_KEY"
kitta auth status --json
Remove-Item Env:KITTA_API_KEY

The environment variable overrides the keyring. Logout cannot remove a variable from the parent shell. The CLI does not automatically load .env files.

The default origin is https://kittaai.com. KITTA_API_URL or --api-url selects another deployment, not an account or balance migration. Credentials and submission records are isolated by origin. Never send a key to an untrusted origin.

Next: quickstart.