OpenShorts CLI

Clip long videos into vertical 9:16 shorts from the terminal. Zero dependencies; talks to the same API the dashboard, the MCP server and the webhooks use.

pip install openshorts        # or: uvx openshorts / pipx run openshorts

export OPENSHORTS_API_KEY=osk_...   # from your account page at openshorts.app

openshorts process "https://youtube.com/watch?v=..." --wait
openshorts clips <job_id>
openshorts publish <job_id> 0 --platforms tiktok,youtube
openshorts quota

Self-hosted instance? Point it at your own machine and skip the key:

export OPENSHORTS_API_URL=http://localhost:8000
openshorts process "https://youtube.com/watch?v=..." --wait

For pipelines, prefer the webhook to --wait: pass --webhook and --webhook-secret and OpenShorts POSTs once (HMAC-signed, X-OpenShorts-Signature: sha256=<hex>) when the job ends, with clip titles and durable download links.

The hosted free tier is 20 minutes/month with a watermark; paid plans from $12/month. The self-hosted edition is MIT and has no meter. Agent-native version of the same surface: openshorts.app/mcp.