Tabstack CLI

The Tabstack CLI brings every Tabstack capability to your terminal: markdown and structured extraction, AI generation, browser automation, and web research. It’s a single static binary with no runtime dependencies, so it drops cleanly into shell scripts, Makefiles, and CI pipelines.

Output is human-readable when you run it in a terminal and switches to JSON automatically when piped, so the same command reads well by hand and parses cleanly in a script.

The CLI is open source on GitHub.

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Install

Install the latest release with the install script:

curl -fsSL https://tabstack.ai/install.sh | sh

This downloads the right prebuilt binary for your platform (macOS, Linux, Windows) and puts tabstack on your PATH.

Verify the install:

tabstack --version

Tip

Prefer to build from source or install with Go? See the project README for go install and source-build instructions.

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Authenticate

You’ll need a Tabstack API key first (get one at tabstack.ai).

Log in once and the key is saved to your config file:

tabstack auth login     # prompts for your API key
tabstack auth status    # shows how the key is being resolved

The CLI resolves your API key in this order of precedence:

1. --api-key flag
2. TABSTACK_API_KEY environment variable
3. Config file at ~/.config/tabstack/config.toml (created with 0600 permissions)

For CI and scripts, set the environment variable instead of logging in:

export TABSTACK_API_KEY="sk_..."

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Commands

Extract markdown

Convert any URL to clean markdown:

tabstack extract markdown https://example.com --metadata

Extract structured JSON

Pull structured data from a page against a JSON schema:

tabstack extract json https://example.com --schema @schema.json

Generate with AI

Generate structured output from a page using natural-language instructions plus a schema:

tabstack generate json https://example.com \
  --instructions "Extract the product name, price, and availability" \
  --schema @schema.json

Browser automation

Drive a browser with a natural-language task:

tabstack agent automate "Find the price of the Pro plan" --url https://example.com

Web research

Run a multi-source research task:

tabstack agent research "latest developments in quantum computing" --mode balanced

Interactive automation

Pause an automation to supply input mid-run (logins, forms), then resume by request ID:

tabstack agent automate "Log in and download the latest invoice" \
  --url https://example.com --interactive

tabstack agent input <request-id> \
  --data '{"fields":[{"ref":"field1","value":"yes"}]}'

See the interactive mode guide for the full pause/resume flow.

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Common options

These flags work across the commands above:

Flag	Description
--effort {min|standard|max}	Trade speed against capability. See effort levels.
--geo <CC>	Route the request through a country (ISO 3166-1 alpha-2). See geotargeting.
--nocache	Bypass the cache and fetch fresh.
-o, --output {pretty|json}	Force the output format (auto-detected by default).
--timeout <dur>	Request timeout, e.g. 30s.
--no-color	Disable colored output.

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Input handling

The --schema, --instructions, and --data flags all accept three input forms:

• A literal string, like --instructions "Extract the title"
• A file with @, like --schema @schema.json
• stdin with - (like curl), as in --schema -

cat schema.json | tabstack extract json https://example.com --schema -

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Output and exit codes

Output auto-detects context: pretty for terminals, JSON when piped. Pipe straight into jq:

tabstack extract markdown https://example.com | jq .

Exit codes make the CLI safe to branch on in scripts:

Code	Meaning
0	Success
1	Runtime / network error
2	Usage / invalid input (e.g. missing API key)
3	API error or task failure

if tabstack extract json "$URL" --schema @schema.json > out.json; then
  echo "extracted"
else
  echo "failed with exit $?"
fi

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Next steps

• API Reference. Full parameter and response details for every endpoint.
• Schema design. Write schemas for extract json and generate json.
• Effort levels. Tune speed vs. capability.
• Interactive mode. Handle logins and forms mid-automation.