Goose

Goose is an open-source autonomous AI coding agent originally developed by Block and now maintained by the Agentic AI Foundation. It runs on your machine as a CLI or desktop application, reads your code, edits files, runs shell commands, and orchestrates multi-step development workflows while you observe and approve each action.

The mental model

Goose functions as an autonomous developer agent that can read, write, and execute on your local system. Unlike code completion tools that suggest snippets, Goose operates on your actual project files and can run tests, build tools, and shell commands.

your prompt
  -> Goose reads relevant files
  -> proposes changes and commands
  -> you approve or reject
  -> Goose applies changes
  -> iterate until done

The agent maintains context across a session. It remembers earlier decisions, file contents it has examined, and the current state of your request. This enables multi-step work where each turn builds on previous actions.

Installation and setup

Goose is available as a CLI and a desktop application. The CLI provides the fastest way to get started with the full feature set.

# Homebrew (macOS, Linux)
brew install block-goose-cli

# Cargo (build from source)
cargo install goose-cli

# Desktop application
# Download from the releases page for macOS, Linux, or Windows

After installation, run goose with no arguments to start an interactive session. The first launch prompts you to configure a model provider.

Interactive and headless modes