ah agent start

Start an agent session.


ah agent start [OPTIONS]

Agent Options

Option	Description	Default
`--agent <TYPE>`	Agent: claude, codex, copilot, gemini, opencode, qwen, cursor-cli, goose, acp	mock
`--model <NAME>`	Model to use (can be overridden by agent-specific flags)	—
`--claude-model <NAME>`	Model for Claude (overrides —model)	—
`--codex-model <NAME>`	Model for Codex (overrides —model)	—
`--copilot-model <NAME>`	Model for Copilot (overrides —model)	—
`--gemini-model <NAME>`	Model for Gemini (overrides —model)	—

Option	Description	Default
`--prompt <TEXT>`	Task prompt to pass to the agent	—
`--cwd <PATH>`	Working directory for agent execution	—
`--non-interactive`	Single turn, then exit	false
`--output-format <FMT>`	text, basic-text, json, stream-json	text
`--agent-ui-style <TYPE>`	native or ah (Agent Harbor unified TUI)	native

Option	Description	Default
`--fs-snapshots <TYPE>`	auto, zfs, btrfs, agentfs, agentfs-fuse, agentfs-interpose, git, disable	auto
`--working-copy <MODE>`	auto, cow-overlay, worktree, in-place	auto
`--from-snapshot <ID>`	Restore workspace from filesystem snapshot	—

Option	Description
`--mcp-config <PATH>`	Path to MCP config file

Start Claude with a prompt:


ah agent start --agent claude --prompt "Add unit tests"

Use a specific model:


ah agent start --agent claude --claude-model sonnet --prompt "Refactor"

Non-interactive mode (single turn):


ah agent start --agent claude --non-interactive --prompt "Fix typo"

With sandbox enabled:


ah agent start --agent claude --sandbox --prompt "Run tests"

With sandbox and network access:


ah agent start --agent claude --sandbox --allow-network true --prompt "Install deps"

With MCP servers:


ah agent start --agent claude --mcp-config ~/.config/mcp.json --prompt "Task"

JSON output:


ah agent start --agent claude --output-format json --prompt "Task"