CLIs are how AI agents get work done

Chrys Bader

@chrysb · Feb 22, 2026

Co-founder & CEO of Rosebud (YC S08)

unpopular (maybe?) opinion: MCP is dead in the water. […] api & cli will win. […] connect 10 servers with 5 tools each and you've burned 50 tool definitions worth of tokens before your conversation even starts. […] the "exec" tool paired with on-demand skills is all you need.

Elvis

@omarsar0 · Mar 1, 2026

Founder of DAIR.AI, ex-Meta AI

MCP is dead? […] I mostly use Skills and CLI lately.

DHH

@dhh · Feb 3, 2026

Creator of Ruby on Rails, Co-founder of 37signals (Basecamp/HEY)

Then we'll release the new agent-optimized CLI for Basecamp. Love to see agents drive their own accommodations.

Andrej Karpathy

@karpathy · Feb 24, 2026

Ex-Tesla AI Director, OpenAI Co-Founder

CLIs are super exciting precisely because they are a "legacy" technology, which means AI agents can natively and easily use them, combine them, interact with them via the entire terminal toolkit. […] It's 2026. Build. For. Agents.

Addy Osmani

@addyosmani · Mar 4, 2026

VP Engineering at Google

Introducing the Google Workspace CLI […] built for humans and agents. Google Drive, Gmail, Calendar, and every Workspace API. 40+ agent skills included.

Guillermo Rauch

@rauchg · Mar 4, 2026

CEO of Vercel

2026 is the year of Skills & CLIs

Mitchell Hashimoto

@mitchellh · Sep 22, 2025

Co-founder of HashiCorp, Creator of Vagrant/Terraform

This is why I'm not a fan of MCP, it speaks only to machines. Better CLI tooling, output formatting, docs helps both machines and humans.

Russell Kaplan

@russelljkaplan · Aug 5, 2024

President of Cognition (Devin), ex-Scale AI, ex-Tesla Autopilot

Companies that market to developers will soon start “marketing” to coding agents as well. [...] Agent-friendly UI/UX (often: a good CLI) will be prioritized.

Armin Ronacher

@mitsuhiko · Jun 25, 2025

Creator of Flask, Jinja2 & Click (Python CLI framework), VP of Engineering at Sentry

I tried with an MCP first but now I just use the CLI.

Simon Willison

@simonw · Oct 30, 2025

Creator of Datasette & LLM CLI

[…] I find CLI tools are almost always a better bet than MCPs when you have an unleashed coding agent like Claude Code in YOLO mode

Peter Steinberger

@steipete · Feb 22, 2026

Creator of OpenClaw

there's a reason I didn't add mcp support to openclaw (except via mcporter mcp-to-cli converter)

Peter Steinberger

@steipete · Nov 7, 2025

Creator of OpenClaw

Convert chrome-devtools (or really any) MCP to compiled cli […] It will call help menu and learn as needed. Progressive disclosure, no context pollution.

Chris Tate

@ctatedev · Jan 29, 2026

Engineer at Vercel, Creator of agent-browser

CLI is the rare interface where making things better for agents makes things better for humans too. And vice versa.

Ryan Carson

@ryancarson · Feb 28, 2026

CEO & 4x Founder (Treehouse)

It's time for you to think about how an agent can use your app via CLI. In the future, none of us (including our agents) are going to want to log in to a web interface to do anything.

Chrys Bader

@chrysb · Feb 22, 2026

Co-founder & CEO of Rosebud (YC S08)

unpopular (maybe?) opinion: MCP is dead in the water. […] api & cli will win. […] connect 10 servers with 5 tools each and you've burned 50 tool definitions worth of tokens before your conversation even starts. […] the "exec" tool paired with on-demand skills is all you need.

Elvis

@omarsar0 · Mar 1, 2026

Founder of DAIR.AI, ex-Meta AI

MCP is dead? […] I mostly use Skills and CLI lately.

DHH

@dhh · Feb 3, 2026

Creator of Ruby on Rails, Co-founder of 37signals (Basecamp/HEY)

Then we'll release the new agent-optimized CLI for Basecamp. Love to see agents drive their own accommodations.

Andrej Karpathy

@karpathy · Feb 24, 2026

Ex-Tesla AI Director, OpenAI Co-Founder

CLIs are super exciting precisely because they are a "legacy" technology, which means AI agents can natively and easily use them, combine them, interact with them via the entire terminal toolkit. […] It's 2026. Build. For. Agents.

Addy Osmani

@addyosmani · Mar 4, 2026

VP Engineering at Google

Introducing the Google Workspace CLI […] built for humans and agents. Google Drive, Gmail, Calendar, and every Workspace API. 40+ agent skills included.

Guillermo Rauch

@rauchg · Mar 4, 2026

CEO of Vercel

2026 is the year of Skills & CLIs

Mitchell Hashimoto

@mitchellh · Sep 22, 2025

Co-founder of HashiCorp, Creator of Vagrant/Terraform

This is why I'm not a fan of MCP, it speaks only to machines. Better CLI tooling, output formatting, docs helps both machines and humans.

Russell Kaplan

@russelljkaplan · Aug 5, 2024

President of Cognition (Devin), ex-Scale AI, ex-Tesla Autopilot

Companies that market to developers will soon start “marketing” to coding agents as well. [...] Agent-friendly UI/UX (often: a good CLI) will be prioritized.

Armin Ronacher

@mitsuhiko · Jun 25, 2025

Creator of Flask, Jinja2 & Click (Python CLI framework), VP of Engineering at Sentry

I tried with an MCP first but now I just use the CLI.

Simon Willison

@simonw · Oct 30, 2025

Creator of Datasette & LLM CLI

[…] I find CLI tools are almost always a better bet than MCPs when you have an unleashed coding agent like Claude Code in YOLO mode

Peter Steinberger

@steipete · Feb 22, 2026

Creator of OpenClaw

there's a reason I didn't add mcp support to openclaw (except via mcporter mcp-to-cli converter)

Chris Tate

@ctatedev · Jan 29, 2026

Engineer at Vercel, Creator of agent-browser

CLI is the rare interface where making things better for agents makes things better for humans too. And vice versa.

Ryan Carson

@ryancarson · Feb 28, 2026

CEO & 4x Founder (Treehouse)

It's time for you to think about how an agent can use your app via CLI. In the future, none of us (including our agents) are going to want to log in to a web interface to do anything.

Chrys Bader

@chrysb · Feb 22, 2026

Co-founder & CEO of Rosebud (YC S08)

unpopular (maybe?) opinion: MCP is dead in the water. […] api & cli will win. […] connect 10 servers with 5 tools each and you've burned 50 tool definitions worth of tokens before your conversation even starts. […] the "exec" tool paired with on-demand skills is all you need.

Chrys Bader

@chrysb · Feb 22, 2026

Co-founder & CEO of Rosebud (YC S08)

unpopular (maybe?) opinion: MCP is dead in the water. […] api & cli will win. […] connect 10 servers with 5 tools each and you've burned 50 tool definitions worth of tokens before your conversation even starts. […] the "exec" tool paired with on-demand skills is all you need.

Elvis

@omarsar0 · Mar 1, 2026

Founder of DAIR.AI, ex-Meta AI

MCP is dead? […] I mostly use Skills and CLI lately.

DHH

@dhh · Feb 3, 2026

Creator of Ruby on Rails, Co-founder of 37signals (Basecamp/HEY)

Then we'll release the new agent-optimized CLI for Basecamp. Love to see agents drive their own accommodations.

Andrej Karpathy

@karpathy · Feb 24, 2026

Ex-Tesla AI Director, OpenAI Co-Founder

CLIs are super exciting precisely because they are a "legacy" technology, which means AI agents can natively and easily use them, combine them, interact with them via the entire terminal toolkit. […] It's 2026. Build. For. Agents.

Addy Osmani

@addyosmani · Mar 4, 2026

VP Engineering at Google

Introducing the Google Workspace CLI […] built for humans and agents. Google Drive, Gmail, Calendar, and every Workspace API. 40+ agent skills included.

Guillermo Rauch

@rauchg · Mar 4, 2026

CEO of Vercel

2026 is the year of Skills & CLIs

Mitchell Hashimoto

@mitchellh · Sep 22, 2025

Co-founder of HashiCorp, Creator of Vagrant/Terraform

This is why I'm not a fan of MCP, it speaks only to machines. Better CLI tooling, output formatting, docs helps both machines and humans.

Russell Kaplan

@russelljkaplan · Aug 5, 2024

President of Cognition (Devin), ex-Scale AI, ex-Tesla Autopilot

Companies that market to developers will soon start “marketing” to coding agents as well. [...] Agent-friendly UI/UX (often: a good CLI) will be prioritized.

Armin Ronacher

@mitsuhiko · Jun 25, 2025

Creator of Flask, Jinja2 & Click (Python CLI framework), VP of Engineering at Sentry

I tried with an MCP first but now I just use the CLI.

Simon Willison

@simonw · Oct 30, 2025

Creator of Datasette & LLM CLI

[…] I find CLI tools are almost always a better bet than MCPs when you have an unleashed coding agent like Claude Code in YOLO mode

Peter Steinberger

@steipete · Feb 22, 2026

Creator of OpenClaw

there's a reason I didn't add mcp support to openclaw (except via mcporter mcp-to-cli converter)

Peter Steinberger

@steipete · Nov 7, 2025

Creator of OpenClaw

Convert chrome-devtools (or really any) MCP to compiled cli […] It will call help menu and learn as needed. Progressive disclosure, no context pollution.

Chris Tate

@ctatedev · Jan 29, 2026

Engineer at Vercel, Creator of agent-browser

CLI is the rare interface where making things better for agents makes things better for humans too. And vice versa.

Ryan Carson

@ryancarson · Feb 28, 2026

CEO & 4x Founder (Treehouse)

It's time for you to think about how an agent can use your app via CLI. In the future, none of us (including our agents) are going to want to log in to a web interface to do anything.

Chrys Bader

@chrysb · Feb 22, 2026

Co-founder & CEO of Rosebud (YC S08)

unpopular (maybe?) opinion: MCP is dead in the water. […] api & cli will win. […] connect 10 servers with 5 tools each and you've burned 50 tool definitions worth of tokens before your conversation even starts. […] the "exec" tool paired with on-demand skills is all you need.

Elvis

@omarsar0 · Mar 1, 2026

Founder of DAIR.AI, ex-Meta AI

MCP is dead? […] I mostly use Skills and CLI lately.

DHH

@dhh · Feb 3, 2026

Creator of Ruby on Rails, Co-founder of 37signals (Basecamp/HEY)

Then we'll release the new agent-optimized CLI for Basecamp. Love to see agents drive their own accommodations.

Andrej Karpathy

@karpathy · Feb 24, 2026

Ex-Tesla AI Director, OpenAI Co-Founder

CLIs are super exciting precisely because they are a "legacy" technology, which means AI agents can natively and easily use them, combine them, interact with them via the entire terminal toolkit. […] It's 2026. Build. For. Agents.

Addy Osmani

@addyosmani · Mar 4, 2026

VP Engineering at Google

Introducing the Google Workspace CLI […] built for humans and agents. Google Drive, Gmail, Calendar, and every Workspace API. 40+ agent skills included.

Guillermo Rauch

@rauchg · Mar 4, 2026

CEO of Vercel

2026 is the year of Skills & CLIs

Mitchell Hashimoto

@mitchellh · Sep 22, 2025

Co-founder of HashiCorp, Creator of Vagrant/Terraform

This is why I'm not a fan of MCP, it speaks only to machines. Better CLI tooling, output formatting, docs helps both machines and humans.

Russell Kaplan

@russelljkaplan · Aug 5, 2024

President of Cognition (Devin), ex-Scale AI, ex-Tesla Autopilot

Companies that market to developers will soon start “marketing” to coding agents as well. [...] Agent-friendly UI/UX (often: a good CLI) will be prioritized.

Armin Ronacher

@mitsuhiko · Jun 25, 2025

Creator of Flask, Jinja2 & Click (Python CLI framework), VP of Engineering at Sentry

I tried with an MCP first but now I just use the CLI.

Simon Willison

@simonw · Oct 30, 2025

Creator of Datasette & LLM CLI

[…] I find CLI tools are almost always a better bet than MCPs when you have an unleashed coding agent like Claude Code in YOLO mode

Peter Steinberger

@steipete · Feb 22, 2026

Creator of OpenClaw

there's a reason I didn't add mcp support to openclaw (except via mcporter mcp-to-cli converter)

Chris Tate

@ctatedev · Jan 29, 2026

Engineer at Vercel, Creator of agent-browser

CLI is the rare interface where making things better for agents makes things better for humans too. And vice versa.

Ryan Carson

@ryancarson · Feb 28, 2026

CEO & 4x Founder (Treehouse)

It's time for you to think about how an agent can use your app via CLI. In the future, none of us (including our agents) are going to want to log in to a web interface to do anything.

Chrys Bader

@chrysb · Feb 22, 2026

Co-founder & CEO of Rosebud (YC S08)

unpopular (maybe?) opinion: MCP is dead in the water. […] api & cli will win. […] connect 10 servers with 5 tools each and you've burned 50 tool definitions worth of tokens before your conversation even starts. […] the "exec" tool paired with on-demand skills is all you need.