prx chat

Start an interactive chat session in the terminal with streaming responses, conversation history, and full tool access.

Usage

prx chat [OPTIONS]

Options

Flag	Short	Default	Description
--provider	-P	config default	LLM provider to use (e.g., anthropic, openai, ollama)
--model	-m	provider default	Model identifier (e.g., claude-sonnet-4-20250514, gpt-4o)
--system	-s		Custom system prompt (overrides config)
--session	-S	new session	Resume a named session
--no-tools		false	Disable tool usage for this session
--no-memory		false	Disable memory reads and writes
--no-stream		false	Wait for full response instead of streaming
--max-turns		unlimited	Maximum conversation turns before auto-exit
--temperature	-t	provider default	Sampling temperature (0.0 - 2.0)

Interactive Controls

Once inside the chat session, the following keyboard shortcuts are available:

Key	Action
Enter	Send message
Shift+Enter or \ then Enter	New line (multi-line input)
Up / Down	Navigate message history
Ctrl+C	Cancel current generation
Ctrl+D	Exit chat session
Ctrl+L	Clear screen

Slash Commands

Type these commands directly in the chat input:

Command	Description
/help	Show available commands
/model <name>	Switch model mid-session
/provider <name>	Switch provider mid-session
/system <prompt>	Update system prompt
/clear	Clear conversation history
/save [name]	Save current session
/load <name>	Load a saved session
/sessions	List saved sessions
/tools	List available tools
/exit	Exit the chat

Examples

# Start with defaults
prx chat

# Use a specific model
prx chat --provider anthropic --model claude-sonnet-4-20250514

# Resume a previous session
prx chat --session project-planning

# Quick question with local model
prx chat --provider ollama --model llama3

# Limit to 10 turns (useful for scripted workflows)
prx chat --max-turns 10

Session Management

Chat sessions are automatically saved when you exit. Each session records:

• Conversation messages (user + assistant)
• Tool calls and results
• Provider and model used
• Timestamp and duration

Sessions are stored in the PRX data directory (~/.local/share/prx/sessions/ by default).

# List all sessions
prx chat --session ""  # empty name lists sessions

# Resume by name
prx chat --session my-project

Multi-line Input

For longer prompts, use multi-line mode. Press Shift+Enter to insert a newline without sending. The prompt indicator changes from > to ... to show you are in multi-line mode.

Alternatively, pipe input from a file:

# The chat still opens interactively, with the file content as the first message
prx chat < prompt.txt

Provider and Model Override

The --provider and --model flags override the defaults from your config file for the duration of the session. You can also switch mid-session using slash commands.

# Start with OpenAI, switch to Anthropic mid-conversation
prx chat --provider openai
# In chat: /provider anthropic
# In chat: /model claude-sonnet-4-20250514

Related

• prx agent -- non-interactive single-turn mode
• Providers Overview -- supported LLM providers
• Memory Overview -- how memory works in conversations
• Tools Overview -- available tools during chat