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Authentication Setup

Perplexity CLI uses API key authentication to access Perplexity AI's Sonar models.

Perplexity API Key (Required)

To use Perplexity CLI, you need a Perplexity API key:

  1. Get your API key from Perplexity API Settings
  2. Configure the key using one of the methods below

Configuration Methods

1. Environment Variable (Recommended)

export PERPLEXITY_API_KEY="your_api_key_here"

2. Project .env File

Create a .env file in your project root:

PERPLEXITY_API_KEY=your_api_key_here

3. Enter after running interactive mode

Managing Your API Key

To update or reconfigure your API key during a session, use the /auth command:

# Within the CLI, type:
/auth

To log out and clear your saved API key:

# Within the CLI, type:
/logout

Persisting Environment Variables with .env Files

You can create a .perplexity/.env file in your project directory or in your home directory. Creating a plain .env file also works, but .perplexity/.env is recommended to keep Perplexity CLI variables isolated from other tools.

Important: Some environment variables (like DEBUG and DEBUG_MODE) are automatically excluded from project .env files to prevent interference with perplexity-cli behavior. Use .perplexity/.env files for perplexity-cli specific variables.

Perplexity CLI automatically loads environment variables from the first .env file it finds, using the following search order:

  1. Starting in the current directory and moving upward toward /, for each directory it checks:
    1. .perplexity/.env
    2. .env
  2. If no file is found, it falls back to your home directory:
    • ~/.perplexity/.env
    • ~/.env

Important: The search stops at the first file encountered—variables are not merged across multiple files.

Examples

Project-specific configuration:

mkdir -p .perplexity
cat >> .perplexity/.env <<'EOF'
PERPLEXITY_API_KEY="pplx-xxxxxxxxxxxx"
EOF

User-wide settings (available in every directory):

mkdir -p ~/.perplexity
cat >> ~/.perplexity/.env <<'EOF'
PERPLEXITY_API_KEY="pplx-xxxxxxxxxxxx"
EOF

Non-Interactive Mode / Headless Environments

When running Perplexity CLI in a non-interactive environment (scripts, CI/CD pipelines, etc.), you must configure authentication using environment variables.

Set the PERPLEXITY_API_KEY environment variable:

export PERPLEXITY_API_KEY="pplx-xxxxxxxxxxxx"
perplexity -p "Your prompt here"

If the API key is not set in a non-interactive session, the CLI will exit with an error.

For comprehensive guidance on using Perplexity CLI programmatically and in automation workflows, see the Headless Mode Guide.