http-prompt

Launch a session targeting the default URL of or the previous session

$ http-prompt

$ http-prompt [http://example.com]

$ http-prompt [localhost:8000/api] --auth [username:password]

http-prompt [options] [URL]

-h, --help
    Show help message and exit

--version
    Show program's version number and exit

--style {default,uber,slack}
    Prompt style to use
(default: default)

--theme {default,monokai,github,solarized,solarized-dark,monokailight,native}
    Pygments syntax highlighting theme

-cj COOKIES, --cookiejar COOKIES
    Cookies file to use

--session SESSION
    Name of session to use

--print-print
    Print HTTPie-style output after each request

--save SAVE
    Name of session to save

--load LOAD
    Name of session to load

--env ENV
    Environment file to use

-v, --verbose
    Verbose output

http-prompt is a powerful, interactive command-line tool for exploring and testing HTTP APIs directly in the terminal. Inspired by tools like Postman and Insomnia, it provides an intuitive REPL-like interface with features such as autocomplete for HTTP methods, headers, and JSON fields, syntax highlighting via Pygments, and response previewing. Users start by launching http-prompt [URL], entering an interactive session where they can issue commands like get /users, post /login json=@file.json, or patch /user/1 data={"name":"New"}. It supports sessions for reusing headers/cookies, environment variables, cookie jars, and multiple styles/themes for enhanced usability. Built on HTTPie and Prompt Toolkit, it's ideal for developers debugging APIs without leaving the CLI. Install via pip install http-prompt; requires Python 3.6+.

Requires Python 3.6+ and pip installation; not in standard distro repos. Sessions saved as JSON files; ensure proper permissions for cookie jars.

pip install http-prompt
Supports shell completions: http-prompt --install-completion

http-prompt https://httpbin.org
Then in prompt:
> get /ip
> post /post json={"key":"value"}
> :q to quit

Developed by George Tang (@zanchey) starting in 2016 as an open-source project on GitHub (http-prompt/http-prompt). Gained popularity for its Postman-like features in CLI; last major release v0.9.1 in 2020. Actively used in API testing workflows, forked/maintained post-original dev.

curl(1), httpie(1), wget(1)