#Manual quickstart

Using Claude Code? Start with the Vatio plugin and describe the agent you want. vatio-init handles the steps below for you. This page is for working directly with the CLI.

You need Node.js 20 or newer and a Vatio account. The examples use acme as a workspace slug; replace it with yours.

#Install the skills

From the root of your project:

npx @vatio-ai/skills

That copies the Vatio skills into .agents/skills/ and .claude/skills/, so the coding agent working in the project — Claude Code, Codex, Cursor or any other — knows how to start a Vatio agent, improve it, and share a session with the Vatio team. With them in place you can skip the rest of this page and ask it to build one; see Claude Code.

#Install the CLI

npm install -g @vatio-ai/cli@latest
vatio --help

#Create a workspace

Run these commands in the repository where you want to keep your agent:

mkdir support-agent
cd support-agent
vatio init acme

init writes vatio.yml in the current directory and asks for no account: you can write the whole agent without signing up for anything. If you are already logged in, it also creates the remote workspace (or uses yours, if it exists).

The account turns up at vatio push, which is the first thing that makes something run on a server. There the CLI opens your browser on Vatio's sign-in page for this terminal (or prints the link, on a machine without a browser). Sign in with your email — we mail you a link that creates your account if it did not exist — or with Google or GitHub, check that the page shows the code your terminal printed, and confirm. That authorizes this terminal and takes you to the inbox at inbox.vatio.ai, whose Start page waits for the push; Test is where you then try it. If the wait is cut off, run vatio push again: it picks up the same sign-in page instead of starting over.

#Define the agent

Replace the starter contents of vatio.yml with:

workspace: acme
agent:
  name: Acme Support
  instructions: |
    Help visitors understand Acme's warehouse robotics.
    Ask what they need help with. If you do not have the information
    to answer, say so. Never invent product details or prices.
  personality: Warm, concise, and clear.

workspace selects the remote workspace. agent.instructions defines what its single agent does. The other fields in this example are optional. The business the agent works for — its name, description and opening hours — is set by whoever runs it on the Business page of the inbox, and the widget's look in Channels → Web widget in the inbox, not in this file.

#Deploy and test

vatio push
vatio chat "What does Acme do?"

push validates your files and deploys to preview. Open the link it prints after Try it:, the inbox's Test page, to chat on the web, WhatsApp or Instagram, or continue the conversation with another chat command.

vatio chat "Can you tell me the price?"
vatio chat show
vatio chat --new "Hi, who am I talking to?"

Check that the agent answers from the supplied context and acknowledges what it does not know. chat show reads the current CLI chat with every tool call; --new starts a new one as a visitor the agent never met.

#Publish

When the preview is ready for customers:

vatio publish

Live is what answers customers through the widget on your site, WhatsApp, Instagram or the SDKs. vatio rollback restores the previous live deployment.

Next, add knowledge, connect your API, or embed the widget.