copilotchat

Chat with GitHub Copilot from your terminal.

copilotchat is a Rust TUI chat app. You connect your own GitHub Copilot account once, pick a model, and chat with streaming replies like a normal assistant app. Auth stays in local app files under ~/.copilotchat/. No Keychain/system secret-store prompt path is used.

Why

• browser-to-localhost permissions were too brittle for the main product path
• CLI keeps auth local
• install is simple
• chat feels fast and direct

Install

Use any supported package manager:

npm i -g @dhruv2mars/copilotchat

bun install -g @dhruv2mars/copilotchat

pnpm add -g @dhruv2mars/copilotchat

First run downloads the native binary into ~/.copilotchat/bin/.

Quickstart

copilotchat

First run flow:

1. open copilotchat
2. approve the GitHub device code
3. search/select a model
4. send a prompt
5. resume the thread later

Commands

copilotchat
copilotchat auth login
copilotchat auth status
copilotchat auth logout
copilotchat models
copilotchat chat "indian capital city?"
copilotchat update

TUI keys

• Enter send
• Shift+Enter newline
• Tab / Shift+Tab move focus
• Ctrl+K focus models
• Ctrl+J focus threads
• Ctrl+M focus composer
• Ctrl+N new chat
• Ctrl+L logout
• Esc stop stream or clear search
• q quit

Install notes

• npm, bun, pnpm, and yarn installs all use the same JS launcher
• the launcher downloads the right native binary on first run
• no postinstall is required, so Bun global installs are usable without trusting scripts
• copilotchat update upgrades with the same package manager used for install when possible

Release binaries

GitHub Releases publish:

• darwin-arm64
• darwin-x64
• linux-arm64
• linux-x64
• win32-arm64
• win32-x64

Local dev

bun install
bun run cli
bun run test
bun run check
bun run build

Real manual verify:

cargo run -p copilotchat-cli -- auth login
cargo run -p copilotchat-cli -- models
cargo run -p copilotchat-cli -- chat "indian capital city?"
cargo run -p copilotchat-cli --

Docs

• Contributing
• Security
• Code of Conduct
• CLI package docs

Release

bunx changeset
bun run release:version
TAG="v$(node -p \"require('./packages/cli/package.json').version\")"
git tag "$TAG"
git push origin "$TAG"

Tags trigger:

• GitHub Release creation
• cross-platform binary builds
• npm publish