@abeedoo/ghost-cli

Minimal CLI for managing Ghost CMS posts, pages, and tags. Zero dependencies.

npm · GitHub

Install

npm install -g @abeedoo/ghost-cli

Or use with npx:

npx @abeedoo/ghost-cli list posts

Setup

Get your Admin API key from Ghost Admin → Settings → Integrations → Add custom integration.

Configure credentials using any of these methods (checked in priority order):

1. Environment variables

export GHOST_URL=https://your-ghost-site.com
export GHOST_ADMIN_API_KEY=your-id:your-secret

2. --env flag

ghost-cli --env /path/to/config list posts

3. .ghost-cli file (recommended)

Create a .ghost-cli file in your project root:

GHOST_URL=https://your-ghost-site.com
GHOST_ADMIN_API_KEY=your-id:your-secret

Add .ghost-cli to your .gitignore — it contains secrets.

4. .env file

Falls back to .env if no .ghost-cli file is found:

GHOST_URL=https://your-ghost-site.com
GHOST_ADMIN_API_KEY=your-id:your-secret

Multi-site config

Your .ghost-cli file can contain multiple sites using [section] headers:

# Default site (used when no --site flag)
GHOST_URL=https://myblog.com
GHOST_ADMIN_API_KEY=id:secret

[staging]
GHOST_URL=https://staging.myblog.com
GHOST_ADMIN_API_KEY=id:secret

[client-blog]
GHOST_URL=https://client.example.com
GHOST_ADMIN_API_KEY=id:secret

Use with the --site flag:

ghost-cli --site staging list posts
ghost-cli --site client-blog publish my-post
ghost-cli list posts                          # uses default

Commands

List content

ghost-cli list posts                    # all posts
ghost-cli list posts --status draft     # drafts only
ghost-cli list posts --status published # published only
ghost-cli list pages                    # all pages

Create a draft

ghost-cli draft my-post-slug "My Post Title" content.md

Creates a draft post from a markdown file. If the file starts with # Title, the first line is stripped (the title comes from the argument). If a post with that slug already exists, it's replaced.

Publish / Unpublish

ghost-cli publish my-post-slug
ghost-cli unpublish my-post-slug

Get post details

ghost-cli get my-post-slug

Shows title, status, URL, preview link, tags, and excerpt.

Update content

ghost-cli update my-post-slug updated-content.md

Replaces the post content from a markdown file. Preserves title, tags, and status.

Delete

ghost-cli delete my-post-slug

List tags

ghost-cli tags

Shows all tags with post counts, sorted by usage.

How It Works

Uses Ghost's Admin API with JWT authentication. The CLI constructs JWTs from your Admin API key using Node's built-in crypto module — no external dependencies.

Posts are created using Ghost's mobiledoc format with a markdown card, which means your markdown is rendered by Ghost's markdown engine (including code blocks, links, images, etc.).

License

MIT — Clifford Meece