simonw’s llm cheatsheet

LLM is an intuitive CLI tool and Python library for interacting with LLMs. It supports both remote APIs and models run locally on your machine. It’s developed by Simon Willison (co-founder of Django), who tends to make complicated things easy to understand.

Installation with pipx

I prefer installing llm with pipx because it creates isolated environments for Python-based tools, avoiding dependency conflicts.

To install llm:

pipx install llm
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To upgrade llm:

pipx upgrade llm
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Managing Plugins

llm relies on plugins for different models and functionalities. You can find a directory of available plugins here.

To install a plugin:

llm install some_plugin
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API Key Management

You’ll need to store API keys for LLM providers. More details can be found in the LLM Setup documentation.

To set an API key (e.g., for OpenAI):

llm keys set openai
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This will prompt you to enter the key:

% llm keys set openai
Enter key:
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To view your stored keys:

llm keys
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Example output:

gemini
openai
openrouter
perplexity
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To find where the keys are stored:

llm keys path
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Example path on Windows:

C:\Users\testycool\AppData\Roaming\io.datasette.llm\keys.json
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Configuring Default Models

To view your current default model:

llm models default
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Example default:

gemini/gemini-2.5-flash-preview-05-20
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To set your default model:

llm models default model_name
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Listing Available Models

To see all available models configured with your installed plugins and keys:

llm models list
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Example output (your list may vary based on installed plugins and configured keys):

OpenAI Chat: gpt-4o (aliases: 4o)
OpenAI Chat: chatgpt-4o-latest (aliases: chatgpt-4o)
OpenAI Chat: gpt-4o-mini (aliases: 4o-mini)
...
GeminiPro: gemini/gemini-2.0-pro-exp-02-05 (aliases: gemini-2.0-pro-exp-02-05)
GeminiPro: gemini/gemini-2.0-flash-lite (aliases: gemini-2.0-flash-lite)
GeminiPro: gemini/gemini-2.5-pro-exp-03-25 (aliases: gemini-2.5-pro-exp-03-25)
GeminiPro: gemini/gemini-2.5-pro-preview-03-25 (aliases: gemini-2.5-pro-preview-03-25)
GeminiPro: gemini/gemini-2.5-flash-preview-04-17 (aliases: gemini-2.5-flash-preview-04-17)
GeminiPro: gemini/gemini-2.5-pro-preview-05-06 (aliases: gemini-2.5-pro-preview-05-06)
GeminiPro: gemini/gemini-2.5-flash-preview-05-20 (aliases: gemini-2.5-flash-preview-05-20)
Default: gemini/gemini-2.5-flash-preview-05-20
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Daily Use with Gemini

For day-to-day usage, I prefer Gemini because it’s free. First, you need to install the llm-gemini plugin:

llm install llm-gemini
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