shadcn CLI

shadcn CLI is the terminal interface for setting up shadcn/ui projects and working with shadcn-compatible registries. It scaffolds frontend apps, inspects available components or blocks, and writes source files directly into your repo.

• Initialize or reconfigure a frontend project with templates, presets, base library selection, monorepo support, and generated components.json config.
• Search registries, view registry payloads before install, and fetch docs, examples, or project info for follow-up edits.
• Add components, blocks, themes, or other registry items to a codebase, or build JSON output for your own shadcn-compatible registry.

• search and view return JSON, and info --json or docs --json expose local project state and component references in machine-readable form.
• add --dry-run, --diff, and --view support inspect-change-verify loops before files are written.
• Best when an agent is already inside a React or Tailwind repo using shadcn-compatible registries; the value is narrower outside that ecosystem, and init or mcp init can still prompt or rewrite local config.

• It is frontend-specific and file-writing by design, so unattended use should pair --dry-run or --diff with repo review.
• Some flows depend on project detection, components.json, environment-backed private registries, or confirmation when overwriting existing config.