Perplexity Releases pplx: A Search API CLI for the Terminal at $5 per 1,000 Requests

On July 27, 2026, Perplexity released pplx, an official CLI client for its Search API. It returns web search results and cleaned page text as JSON directly in the terminal, at a price of 5 dollars per 1000 requests.

What pplx can do

pplx offers exactly two working commands and is not a chat client. The pplx search web command runs a live web search, while pplx content fetch pulls a given URL and returns the cleaned text of the page. According to the documentation, the tool is designed equally for humans and for coding agents, but it has no conversational mode, no model selection and no synthesized answer. For content fetch, the documentation advises checking the error and is_paywall fields in the output before using the text, and the --html flag adds live raw HTML via a crawler.

• Two commands: pplx search web (search) and pplx content fetch (page extraction)
• Output is always JSON, never chat
• Search API price: 5.00 dollars per 1000 requests
• Limit: 50 QPS on all plans
• Platforms: macOS on Apple Silicon, Linux x86_64 and Linux arm64

How the output contract works

pplx builds its behavior around a predictable output contract, which is its main feature for automation. Success means exit code 0 and exactly one JSON object in stdout; search returns a structure with a hits array, a total field and an optional saved_to. Any failure ends with exit code 1 and an empty stdout, while a single JSON error object goes to stderr with the fields code, message, command and an optional hint.

"Success is exit code 0 and exactly one JSON object in stdout," the official pplx-cli

Agent Skill states.

The documented error codes are AUTHENTICATION, UNKNOWN_ARGUMENT, ARGUMENT_ERROR and BAD_REQUEST. The list is not exhaustive, so calling code should branch on the error.code field rather than rely on a fixed set. This contract lets an agent reliably tell success from failure by exit code, without parsing the response text.

Installation and context savings

Installing pplx takes a single shell command that downloads a script and pipes it to sh; the binary lands in ~/.local/bin/pplx without sudo. The script pulls manifest.json from the latest release, pins the version across all downloads (to avoid hitting a concurrent publish), verifies the SHA256 checksum and only then installs the file. There is no support for Windows or Intel-based macOS; only three platforms are available.

Perplexity paid particular attention to saving context window space, which is critical for agents. The --output-dir flag writes the full result to a JSON file, while --stdout-preview truncates long string fields in stdout and adds truncated markers. One important catch: --stdout-preview does not work without a save directory, since truncation is enabled only together with --output-dir or the PPLX_OUTPUT_DIR variable. For CI and agents, authentication via pplx auth login is unavailable because it works only in a TTY, so the key is passed through the PERPLEXITY_API_KEY variable.

What this means

Perplexity is packaging its search engine as a tool built for coding agents: a strict JSON contract, predictable exit codes and control over token spend make the Search API a convenient building block for autonomous pipelines, not just for a human at a keyboard.

Frequently asked questions

How much does pplx cost?

The CLI itself is free, but calls to the Search API are billed: 5.00 dollars per 1000 requests, with a limit of 50 QPS on all plans.

Does pplx work on Windows?

No. Only macOS on Apple Silicon, Linux x86_64 and Linux arm64 are supported. The release has no builds for Windows or Intel-based macOS.

Is it a replacement for the Perplexity chatbot?

No. pplx is not a chat client: it has no conversational mode, no model selection and no synthesized answer, only web search and page text extraction in JSON.