Installation

Supported Platforms

The macOS and Linux installer needs curl and either sha256sum or shasum. On Linux, the background daemon runs as a systemctl --user service.

macOS & Linux

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/steroidkit/releases/main/install.sh | sh

The installer:

1. Detects your OS and architecture (it prints, for example, Darwin arm64 detected).
2. Looks up the latest release. If that version is already installed it stops with already installed — nothing to do; if an older one is, it updates, asking first when run interactively.
3. Downloads the binary and checks its SHA-256 against the release's checksum file. A mismatch aborts the install; if a release has no checksum file, the installer says so and skips the check. There is no signature check.
4. Installs it to ~/.steroid/bin/steroid, keeping any previous binary as steroid.bak, and adds a small launcher at ~/.local/bin/steroid.
5. Adds ~/.local/bin to your PATH in ~/.zshrc (zsh) or ~/.bash_profile / ~/.bashrc (bash). For fish it prints the command to run instead.
6. Installs the /steroid-onboard skill into each coding agent it finds (Claude Code, Cursor, Codex, Copilot).

It does not start the background daemon, open the setup screens, or change any IDE configuration — those happen when you first run steroid.

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/steroidkit/releases/main/install.sh | FORCE=1 sh

Windows

irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/steroidkit/releases/main/install.ps1 | iex

• Installs %USERPROFILE%\.steroid\bin\steroid.exe with the same SHA-256 check and version guard.
• Adds a launcher, %USERPROFILE%\.local\bin\steroid.bat, and puts that folder at the front of your user PATH — no admin prompt.
• Installs the /steroid-onboard skill into detected coding agents.
• Open a new terminal afterwards so the PATH change takes effect.

$env:FORCE=1; irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/steroidkit/releases/main/install.ps1 | iex

Verify the Installation

steroid --version        # e.g. steroid 0.3.8
command -v steroid       # ~/.local/bin/steroid (Windows: Get-Command steroid)
steroid doctor           # one line per check: ✓ pass  ✗ fail  ⚠ warn  · info

“steroid: command not found”

Open a new terminal first — the PATH change only applies to new shells. The installer chooses the profile file from your login shell ($SHELL), so if you use a different shell, add the line yourself:

You can always run the binary directly: ~/.steroid/bin/steroid, or %USERPROFILE%\.steroid\bin\steroid.exe on Windows.

File Layout

Everything Steroid writes lives under ~/.steroid/(%USERPROFILE%\.steroid\ on Windows). The installer creates only bin/; the rest appears on first run.

~/.steroid/
├── bin/
│   ├── steroid               # the CLI (steroid.exe on Windows)
│   ├── steroid.bak           # previous version, after a reinstall or update
│   └── .version              # installed release tag
├── config.json               # mode, selected agents
├── projects.json             # projects registered for recall
├── memory/                   # recall indexes, one folder per coding agent
├── cryptfile_pass.cfg        # encrypted credential store (not the OS keychain)
├── .cryptfile_key            # key for the store — protect it like a password
├── credentials_index.json    # names of stored credentials, no values
└── logs/                     # daemon logs (macOS and Linux)

~/.local/bin/steroid          # launcher on PATH (steroid.bat on Windows)

Background daemon registration

Next Steps

1. Run steroid. First-run setup asks you to choose Local only or Connected, then which coding agents to connect.
2. For Connected mode, paste the connection string from your dashboard when asked. Local mode needs no account.
3. Or, from inside your coding agent, run the /steroid-onboard skill the installer added.
4. Restart your coding agent so it loads the Steroid MCP server.

To update or remove Steroid, see Updating & Uninstalling.