CLI Reference

Everything Pentest Swarm AI does is available from the pentestswarm binary. There are two ways in: run (the interactive front door) and scan (the scriptable engine underneath it). Everything else — health checks, the toolchain installer, the MCP and API servers, playbooks — hangs off the same binary as subcommands.

run vs scan

• pentestswarm run is the front door: an interactive TUI launcher. Pick your provider and paste a key in the UI, choose a target or a bundled lab, set a spend cap, choose your live view, and launch — no flags to remember. It runs readiness checks for you and then calls scan under the hood.
• pentestswarm scan … is the engine: fully flag-driven and scriptable, so it drops straight into CI, cron, or a shell script. run is just a friendly wrapper around it.

Use run when you're driving it by hand; use scan when you're automating.

Where to go deeper

This page is the flag-level reference. For the concepts behind the flags see Scan Modes (--mode), Providers (--provider), Cost & Safety (--budget, --safe-mode, --scope), Live Views (--tui, --follow), and Configuration (init, doctor, install-tools).

Commands

pentestswarm run

⭐ Interactive TUI launcher — the recommended starting point. Walks you through provider + key, target or bundled lab, scan mode, spend cap, live-view choice, and readiness checks, then launches the swarm. It also opens the web dashboard on localhost:7777 immediately, so it's ready the moment you launch.

pentestswarm run

pentestswarm scan <target>

Run a scan against a target. This is the engine every other entry point drives.

export PENTESTSWARM_ORCHESTRATOR_API_KEY=your-key
pentestswarm scan example.com --scope example.com --swarm --follow

Key flags

Flag	What it does
--scope <scope>	Authorized scope — CIDRs / domains, comma-separated. Enforced at the tool layer and the executor; not bypassable. Non-lab scans require it (defaults to the target itself if omitted). See Cost & Safety.
--swarm	Enable the stigmergic swarm scheduler (dozens of agents working concurrently) instead of a linear pass.
--tui	Full-screen terminal live view — boxed panels, sparklines, risk + spend meters, the stigmergic blackboard. See Live Views.
--follow	Stream progress to the terminal as plain log lines (good for CI).
--mode <mode>	Engagement type: manual · bugbounty · ctf · asm. See Scan Modes.
--budget <usd>	Hard per-run USD spend cap; the swarm winds down gracefully when it's reached. 0 = no cap. See Cost & Safety.
--safe-mode	Block destructive command tokens (rm, DROP, kill, chmod, …) before execution.
--active-scan	Toggle active exploitation tools. On by default except in asm mode; --active-scan=true forces them back on in ASM.
--provider <name>	LLM provider: together · claude · openai · gemini · orcarouter · ollama · lmstudio. See Providers.
--lab / --lab-target <lab>	Attack a bundled, intentionally-vulnerable lab (crapi, juiceshop, vampi, dvga) that spins up and tears down in Docker.
--dry-run	Plan the run and show what the swarm would do without executing tools or spending on the LLM.
--estimate	Print a cost/scope estimate for the run and exit.

A typical scriptable run:

export PENTESTSWARM_ORCHESTRATOR_API_KEY=your-key
pentestswarm scan example.com \
  --scope example.com \
  --mode bugbounty \
  --provider together \
  --budget 5 \
  --safe-mode \
  --swarm --follow

pentestswarm scan --tui

Run with the full-screen live dashboard in your terminal — boxed panels for the swarm cluster, findings, telemetry sparklines, and risk + spend meters, plus the animated stigmergic blackboard.

pentestswarm scan <target> --scope <target> --swarm --tui

See Live Views / Dashboard for everything the web and terminal views show.

pentestswarm scan --lab --lab-target <lab>

Attack a bundled, intentionally-vulnerable lab that spins up, gets attacked, and tears down — no setup, no external target, no scope flag needed. Requires Docker.

pentestswarm scan --lab --lab-target crapi --provider ollama --swarm --tui

Labs: crapi, juiceshop, vampi, dvga.

pentestswarm doctor

System health check — verifies Go, Docker, installed recon tools, and provider configuration, and tells you what (if anything) to fix. See Configuration.

pentestswarm doctor

pentestswarm init

Write a starter config.yaml you can edit — orchestrator provider/model/key and optional per-agent overrides. See Configuration.

pentestswarm init

pentestswarm install-tools

Fetch the recon / exploit toolchain (subfinder, httpx, nuclei, naabu, katana, dnsx, gau, nmap, …) so the swarm has real tools to operate.

pentestswarm install-tools

pentestswarm playbook run <name> --target <t>

Run a deterministic attack chain (a playbook) against a target. See Playbooks.

pentestswarm playbook run bug-bounty --target example.com

pentestswarm mcp serve

Start the MCP (Model Context Protocol) server so Claude Desktop, Cursor, and other MCP clients can drive the swarm as a tool.

pentestswarm mcp serve

pentestswarm serve

Start the API server together with the web dashboard.

pentestswarm serve

pentestswarm docs

Open the documentation site in your browser.

pentestswarm docs

pentestswarm upgrade

Update the binary in place to the latest release.

pentestswarm upgrade

pentestswarm version

Print the installed version.

pentestswarm version

Quick tour

pentestswarm run                                        # ⭐ Interactive TUI — no flags
pentestswarm scan <target> --scope <scope> --swarm      # Scriptable swarm scan
pentestswarm scan <target> --scope <scope> --tui        # Full-screen live dashboard
pentestswarm scan --lab --lab-target crapi              # Attack a bundled lab
pentestswarm scan <target> --scope <scope> --budget 5   # With a hard spend cap
pentestswarm playbook run <name> --target <t>           # Run a playbook
pentestswarm init                                       # Write a starter config
pentestswarm doctor                                     # Health check
pentestswarm install-tools                              # Fetch the toolchain
pentestswarm mcp serve                                  # MCP server (Claude / Cursor)
pentestswarm serve                                      # API server + dashboard
pentestswarm docs                                       # Open the docs site
pentestswarm upgrade                                    # Update in place
pentestswarm version                                    # Print version