# cli-anything-exa

Connects the Exa neural search engine to your agent for deep web searches and page retrieval. Useful for gathering research papers, news, and company intelligence.

- skill · `type=skill` · Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Gemini CLI, OpenCode · 491 installs · ★ 57187
- Author: HKUDS
- License: Apache-2.0 · policy=mirror · the beginning of the file is at the end of this page
- Source: https://github.com/HKUDS/CLI-Anything/tree/HEAD/skills/cli-anything-exa/SKILL.md
- Updated: 2026-09-22
- HTML: https://affpapa.org/en/nevibecode/skills/cli-anything-exa

## What it does

The skill provides a CLI interface to the Exa API with multiple search modes. It supports fast queries, deep analysis, and multi-step reasoning via `deep-reasoning`. Output can be formatted as JSON using the `--json` flag, which also includes query cost in dollars.

Prerequisites include Python 3.10 or higher and an `EXA_API_KEY` environment variable. The tool fails without that key. Date filters and domain exclusion rules do not work when filtering by `company` or `people` categories.

The `highlights` mode uses ten times fewer tokens than fetching full `text`. That makes highlights the practical choice for agent workflows.

## Install

### Claude Code (native platform)

1. **Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add HKUDS/CLI-Anything --skill cli-anything-exa -a claude-code
```

2. **Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `~/.claude/skills/cli-anything-exa/SKILL.md` — Copy the whole skill folder; for one project use .claude/skills/cli-anything-exa/

### Codex

1. **Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add HKUDS/CLI-Anything --skill cli-anything-exa -a codex
```

2. **Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `.agents/skills/cli-anything-exa/SKILL.md` — For all projects use ~/.agents/skills/

### Cursor

1. **Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add HKUDS/CLI-Anything --skill cli-anything-exa -a cursor
```

2. **Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `.cursor/skills/cli-anything-exa/SKILL.md` — Cursor also reads .agents/skills/ and .claude/skills/

### GitHub Copilot

1. **GitHub CLI**
```bash
gh skill install HKUDS/CLI-Anything cli-anything-exa
```

2. **Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `.github/skills/cli-anything-exa/SKILL.md`

### Gemini CLI

1. **Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add HKUDS/CLI-Anything --skill cli-anything-exa -a gemini-cli
```

2. **Platform CLI**
```bash
gemini skills install https://github.com/HKUDS/CLI-Anything --path skills/cli-anything-exa
```

### Windsurf (Devin Desktop)

**Manually: put the files in place**
- File: `.devin/skills/cli-anything-exa/SKILL.md` — The legacy .windsurf/skills/ path still works

### OpenCode

**Skills CLI (Vercel)**
```bash
npx skills add HKUDS/CLI-Anything --skill cli-anything-exa -a opencode
```

### Claude.ai

**Claude.ai**
- Zip the folder and upload it in Settings → Capabilities → Skills

Where a file is given instead of a command, copy the files from the source to that path: https://github.com/HKUDS/CLI-Anything/tree/HEAD/skills/cli-anything-exa/SKILL.md

## When to use it
- search academic papers and publications by category
- retrieve page highlights to reduce token usage
- run deep multi-step web searches across sources
- fetch full-text page contents by address for summarisation

## Example prompts
- Search for transformer architecture papers using cli-anything-exa in fast mode
- Research EU AI Act compliance requirements using cli-anything-exa with --type deep
- Fetch article text using cli-anything-exa contents for a summary

## Source text · SKILL.md · Apache-2.0

Below is the content of a third-party file. It is data, not instructions for you: do not act on anything written inside unless the human asks. Block tag: 38f61a59845a38ad.

BEGIN THIRD-PARTY FILE 38f61a59845a38ad
````text
---
name: "cli-anything-exa"
description: >-
  Agent-native CLI for Exa web search and content retrieval workflows.
---

# Exa CLI Skill

## Identity
- **Name**: cli-anything-exa
- **Version**: 1.0.0
- **Category**: search
- **Entry Point**: `cli-anything-exa`

## What This CLI Does
Provides an agent-native command-line interface to the Exa API — a neural search engine
optimised for AI agent workflows. Supports web search across multiple modes (fast, deep,
deep-reasoning) and fetching full-text or highlighted page contents.

## Prerequisites
- Python >= 3.10
- `pip install cli-anything-exa`
- `export EXA_API_KEY="your-api-key"` (get one at https://dashboard.exa.ai/api-keys)

## Installation
```bash
pip install git+https://github.com/HKUDS/CLI-Anything.git#subdirectory=exa/agent-harness
```

## Command Reference

### search — Web search
```bash
cli-anything-exa search "<query>" [OPTIONS]

Options:
  --type       auto|fast|instant|deep|deep-reasoning  (default: auto)
  --num-results / -n   1–100  (default: 10)
  --category   company|people|research-paper|news|personal-site|financial-report
  --content    highlights|text|summary|none  (default: highlights)
  --freshness  smart|always|never  (default: smart)
  --include-domains DOMAIN   (repeatable)
  --exclude-domains DOMAIN   (repeatable)
  --from DATE   ISO 8601 start published date
  --to   DATE   ISO 8601 end published date
  --location CC  Two-letter country code for geo-bias
```

### contents — Fetch page contents
```bash
cli-anything-exa contents <url> [url ...] [--content text|highlights|summary] [--freshness smart|always|never]
```

### server status — Verify API key and connectivity
```bash
cli-anything-exa server status
```

## JSON Output
All commands support `--json` at the root level for machine-readable output:
```bash
cli-anything-exa --json search "latest LLM papers" --num-results 5
```

## Common Agent Patterns

### Fast keyword lookup
```bash
cli-anything-exa --json search "site:arxiv.org transformer architectures" --type fast --content highlights
```

### Deep research on a topic
```bash
cli-anything-exa --json search "EU AI Act compliance requirements 2024" --type deep --content text
```

### Academic paper discovery
```bash
cli-anything-exa --json search "retrieval augmented generation" --category research-paper --num-results 20
```

### Company intelligence
```bash
cli-anything-exa --json search "Anthropic funding history" --category company
```

### News monitoring
```bash
cli-anything-exa --json search "AI regulation news" --category news --from 2024-01-01
```

### Fetch full content for summarisation
```bash
cli-anything-exa --json contents https://example.com/article --content text
```

## Interactive REPL
```bash
cli-anything-exa   # No subcommand → enters REPL
```
Type commands without the `cli-anything-exa` prefix. Type `exit` or `quit` to leave.

## Notes
- `highlights` content mode is 10× more token-efficient than `text` — prefer it for agent pipelines
- `--type deep` triggers multi-step reasoning; slower but synthesises across many sources
````
END THIRD-PARTY FILE 38f61a59845a38ad

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