glab duo

Overview

glab duo is centered on the GitLab Duo Agent Platform. The current visible command surface exposes glab duo cli; the legacy glab duo ask command is hidden and deprecated.

Quick start

glab duo --help

Command surface guidance

Upstream glab now hides and deprecates glab duo ask.

Treat glab duo ask as legacy guidance only for older installed versions that still expose it in live help. For current forward-looking documentation, prefer:

glab duo cli

Use glab duo cli for the forward-looking GitLab Duo Agent Platform experience. glab handles authentication for the Duo CLI after you authenticate once with glab auth login.

Prerequisites for the GA path are GitLab 19.2 or later and the GitLab Duo Agent Platform prerequisites. GitLab Self-Managed and Dedicated instances must also allow Duo CLI access. GitLab 18.11 through 19.1 require beta and experimental features to be enabled.

Installing GitLab Duo CLI

glab duo cli supports install, update, and non-interactive confirmation flags. Prefer the explicit update subcommand; --update remains equivalent:

# Install GitLab Duo CLI interactively
glab duo cli --install

# Install GitLab Duo CLI non-interactively (auto-confirm)
glab duo cli --install --yes

# Check for and install a compatible Duo CLI update
glab duo cli update

# Legacy-equivalent flag form
glab duo cli --update

Use --install to download and install the GitLab Duo CLI binaries. Use --yes to skip confirmation prompts during installation, which is useful for automation and CI/CD pipelines. Updates stay within the major version supported by the installed glab release; update glab first when Duo reports a newer major version. The update command does not replace a custom binary configured through GLAB_DUO_CLI_BINARY_PATH or duo_cli_binary_path.

Interactive and headless modes

# Interactive, multi-prompt session with build and plan modes
glab duo cli

# One bounded prompt for a runner, script, or automated workflow
glab duo cli run --goal "Fix the failing tests in this project"

# Wrapper help versus the installed Duo CLI's own command surface
glab duo cli --help
glab duo cli help

Use headless run --goal only with a bounded task, an isolated working tree, explicit stop conditions, and an independent review of the resulting changes. glab passes unknown arguments and flags through to the Duo CLI binary, so verify the installed Duo CLI's own help before relying on forwarded options.

To persist wrapper prompt behavior, set duo_cli_auto_download and duo_cli_auto_run with glab config set ... --global. --yes skips confirmation prompts for the current invocation.

Important documentation note

Guidance that recommends glab duo update is stale; the current wrapper form is glab duo cli update, with glab duo cli --update retained as an equivalent flag form. Rely on live help before using any Duo subcommand that is not documented here.

When local CLI help and external documentation diverge during a transition, document the current upstream direction clearly and note compatibility caveats only when they materially affect usage.

Subcommands

See references/commands.md for full --help output.