Perplexity CLI Skill
Overview
Perplexity CLI is a command-line interface for Perplexity AI that allows AI-powered searches directly from the terminal with support for multiple models, streaming output, and file attachments.
Prerequisites
# Verify installation
perplexity --help
Quick Reference
| Command | Description |
|---|
perplexity "query" --mode pro --json | Search with pro mode and JSON output |
| Mode | Flag | Description |
|---|
| pro | --mode pro | Deep search with reasoning (default) |
Common Operations
Basic Query
perplexity "What is quantum computing?" --mode pro --json
Read Query from File, Save Response
perplexity -f question.md -o answer.md --mode pro --json
Query with Sources
perplexity "Climate research" --sources web,scholar --mode pro --json
All Flags
| Flag | Short | Description |
|---|
--json | | Output in JSON format (REQUIRED for scripts) |
--mode | | Search mode |
--sources | -s | Sources: web,scholar,social |
--language | -l | Response language (e.g., en-US, pt-BR) |
--file | -f | Read query from file |
--output | -o | Save response to file |
Best Practices
- ALWAYS use
--mode pro --json for all queries (pro mode with JSON output) - DO NOT use
--model flag - model is configured by the user in config - Use
-f and -o flags for batch processing
Piping and Scripting
# Pipe query from stdin (JSON output)
echo "What is Go?" | perplexity --mode pro --json
# Use in scripts (JSON output REQUIRED)
RESPONSE=$(perplexity "Quick answer" --mode pro --json 2>/dev/null)
# Batch processing (JSON output)
cat questions.txt | while read q; do
perplexity "$q" --mode pro -o "answers/$(echo $q | md5sum | cut -c1-8).md" --json
done
