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slackctl

A fast, scriptable command-line tool for the Slack Web API — gh-style ergonomics, structured output, and a live event stream.

$ slackctl conversations list
ID           NAME        IS_PRIVATE  IS_ARCHIVED  NUM_MEMBERS
C0123ABCD    general     false       false        42
C0456EFGH    eng-alerts  false       false        17

$ slackctl msg post --channel C0456EFGH --text "deploy finished ✅"
$ slackctl listen --dms --json | jq -r .text

What it does

  • Conversations & messaging — list/inspect channels, DMs and threads, read history, post/edit/schedule/delete messages, mark as read, export a channel to JSONL, post from a template.
  • Search, people & groups — full-text search (user or bot token), user lookup, set your status/presence/DND, usergroup management.
  • Files, canvases, reactions, pins, bookmarks & saved items — upload/download files, create canvases, and the usual channel adornments.
  • A live event stream (slackctl listen) over Socket Mode or RTM, auto-selected by the credential you have.
  • Structured output — table / json / yaml / csv, --columns, a built-in --jq filter, and cursor pagination (--all).
  • Safe by design — tokens in the OS keyring, --dry-run prints the exact curl, an MCP server and an agent guard so AI agents can drive Slack without touching the dangerous verbs.

Install

go install github.com/jjuanrivvera/slackctl/cmd/slackctl@latest
# or: brew install jjuanrivvera/slackctl/slackctl-cli

First steps

slackctl auth login          # store a bot token — or --kind session for xoxc/xoxd
slackctl auth status         # who am I?
slackctl conversations list
slackctl msg post --channel C0123456 --text "hello from slackctl"

Where to next