Install Privy CLI and log in

You need Node.js 22.18 or later and your OS credential store (macOS Keychain, Windows Credential Manager or Linux Secret Service). Bun is not required.

Install

npm

npm install -g @awesamarth/privy-cli

bun

bun install -g @awesamarth/privy-cli

pnpm

pnpm add -g @awesamarth/privy-cli

yarn v1

yarn global add @awesamarth/privy-cli

Yarn 2 and later don’t support global installs, so use npm, Bun or pnpm there. Check it worked:

privy --version
privy doctor     # local checks only; no Privy API calls

Log in

privy auth login

The CLI asks for your Privy dashboard email, opens a local page in your browser for the CAPTCHA, then asks for the email code at a hidden terminal prompt. Pasted characters won’t show either. The session is saved in your OS keychain, not in a file.

Next time your access expires, privy auth login renews the saved session without the browser or email code. To sign in again from scratch, use privy auth login --replace.

privy auth status --remote   # checks the session against Privy; never renews or changes anything

Pick your account and app

privy accounts list
privy apps list

Pass the app to any command with --app APP_ID, or bind the current folder once so you don’t have to:

privy --app APP_ID project init --yes
privy project show

project init writes a small privy.json with the profile and app ID. It never stores credentials.

Several logins

Profiles keep separate sessions and app selections, for example one for work and one for side projects:

privy --profile work auth login
privy --profile work apps list

See Log in and sessions for session recovery and the optional browser-session import.