Kimi CLI

Canonical version: Kimi CLI.

Kimi CLI (official name: Kimi Code CLI) is Moonshot AI's open-source terminal-native AI coding agent, the CLI surface of the Kimi Code product. It runs an agentic loop in the terminal, operating on code, files, and shell commands via natural language, backed by the Kimi K2 model line.

It is positioned alongside Claude Code and Gemini CLI as a first-class agentic coding CLI — distinguishing itself with open-weight model support and native Agent Client Protocol (ACP) integration.

Key Features

• Interactive CLI (kimi) — conversational AI agent in the terminal with natural language or shell command execution
• Browser UI (kimi web) — local browser interface with session management and file references
• ACP service (kimi acp) — runs as a service exposing the Agent Client Protocol for IDE integration (e.g., Zed, OpenClaw)
• Shell mode — toggle with Ctrl-X to run shell commands directly inside Kimi CLI
• Model Context Protocol (MCP) support — connects to local (stdio) and remote (http/sse) MCP servers; manage with kimi mcp sub-commands
• Multi-provider — supports Moonshot AI, OpenAI, Claude, and Gemini as backends
• Tool approval flow — built-in approval and timeout controls for external tool execution

Built-in Tools

File read/write, shell execution, code analysis, web search and fetch.

Commands

• kimi — start interactive session
• kimi web — open browser UI
• kimi acp — start ACP service
• kimi mcp — manage MCP server configurations

Positioning

Kimi CLI is Moonshot's answer to Claude Code and Gemini CLI in the agentic terminal agent space, with two differentiating bets:

1. Open-weight models (K2 line) can be self-hosted
2. First-class ACP support makes it a drop-in backend for any ACP-compatible editor or orchestrator

References

• GitHub: https://github.com/MoonshotAI/kimi-cli
• Docs: https://moonshotai.github.io/kimi-cli/en/guides/getting-started.html
• Kimi Code Docs: https://www.kimi.com/code/docs/en/kimi-code-cli/getting-started.html
• API platform: https://platform.kimi.ai

Related

• Kimi Code
• Kimi
• Moonshot AI
• AI Agent Harness
• Claude Code
• Gemini CLI
• GitHub Copilot CLI
• Model Context Protocol (MCP)
• AI Agents
• Agentic Engineering
• Agentic Development Environment (ADE)

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