SlimFile CLI

Official command-line interface for the SlimFile API — compress images, PDFs, and Office documents directly from your terminal with up to 95% file size reduction without quality loss.

Table of Contents

• Features
• Supported Formats
• Requirements
• Installation
• Getting an API Key
• Quick Start
• Commands
  • login
  • config
  • compress
  • batch
  • stats
  • interactive
• Examples
• Output
• Configuration File
• Error Handling
• Updating
• Uninstalling

Features

• Reduce file sizes by up to 95% without quality loss
• Compress images, PDFs, PPTX, DOCX, and XLSX files from your terminal
• Batch compress entire folders using glob patterns
• Output as extracted files or as a ZIP archive
• View detailed usage statistics and analytics
• Interactive mode for guided compression without memorizing commands
• Stores your API key locally — no need to pass it on every command
• Works on macOS, Linux, and Windows

Supported Formats

| Format | Extension | |--------|-----------| | JPEG | .jpg, .jpeg | | PNG | .png | | WebP | .webp | | PDF | .pdf | | PowerPoint | .pptx | | Word | .docx | | Excel | .xlsx |

Note: Legacy formats (.ppt, .doc, .xls) are not supported. Convert them to the modern format first.

Requirements

• Node.js 14.0.0 or higher
• A SlimFile API key — get one here

Installation

Install the CLI globally so the slimfile command is available everywhere:

npm install -g @slimfile/cli

Verify the installation:

slimfile --version

Getting an API Key

1. Create a free account at api.slim-file.com/signup
2. Log in at api.slim-file.com/signin
3. Navigate to API Keys in your dashboard
4. Click Create API Key and copy it

API keys start with sk_ followed by a long string of characters.

Quick Start

# 1. Install
npm install -g @slimfile/cli

# 2. Run setup — creates or logs into your account and generates an API key automatically
slimfile setup

# 3. Compress a file
slimfile compress photo.jpg

# Done! Your compressed file is saved as photo_compressed.jpg

Commands

setup

The recommended first command after installation. Creates a new account or logs into an existing one, then automatically generates and saves an API key — all from the terminal.

slimfile setup

You will be asked:

1. Do you have an account? (yes / no)
2. If no — enter your name, email, and password to create a free account
3. If yes — enter your email and password to log in
4. A slimfile-cli API key is automatically created and saved to ~/.slimfile/config.json

After setup you are ready to compress files immediately.

If you try to compress a file without running setup first, the CLI will automatically launch the setup flow for you.

login

Log in to your SlimFile account. Required to use the stats command.

slimfile login

You will be prompted for your email and password. Your session token is saved locally — you only need to log in once.

config

Manage your CLI configuration.

Set your API key

slimfile config set-key <apiKey>

slimfile config set-key sk_abc123...

Your API key is saved to ~/.slimfile/config.json and used automatically on every compress and batch command.

Show current configuration

slimfile config show

Output:

SlimFile Configuration
────────────────────────────────────────
  API Key: sk_abc123...ef56
  API URL: https://api.slim-file.com
  Session: logged in
  Config:  /Users/you/.slimfile/config.json

compress

Compress a single file.

slimfile compress <file> [options]

Options:

| Option | Description | Default | |--------|-------------|---------| | -o, --output <path> | Output file path | <name>_compressed.<ext> | | --quality <number> | Compression quality (1–100) | 80 |

Examples:

# Compress an image (auto output name)
slimfile compress photo.jpg

# Compress with a custom output path
slimfile compress document.pdf -o smaller_document.pdf

# Compress with quality setting
slimfile compress banner.png --quality 70

# Compress a PowerPoint
slimfile compress presentation.pptx -o presentation_compressed.pptx

# Compress a Word document
slimfile compress report.docx

# Compress an Excel file
slimfile compress data.xlsx -o data_small.xlsx

Output:

✔ Compressed successfully
────────────────────────────────────────
  Input:   3.45 MB  photo.jpg
  Output:  890.2 KB  photo_compressed.jpg
  Saved:   2.58 MB (74.8% reduction)

Note: PNG and WebP files are converted to JPEG after compression. All other formats keep their original extension.

batch

Compress multiple files at once using a glob pattern.

slimfile batch <pattern> [options]

Options:

| Option | Description | Default | |--------|-------------|---------| | -o, --output <path> | Output directory or ZIP path | ./compressed | | --zip | Save as a ZIP archive instead of extracting | false |

Examples:

# Compress all JPGs in a folder (extracted to ./compressed/)
slimfile batch "./images/*.jpg"

# Compress all PDFs
slimfile batch "./documents/*.pdf"

# Compress multiple file types
slimfile batch "./files/*.{jpg,png,pdf,docx}"

# Compress all images in a folder and extract to a specific directory
slimfile batch "./assets/*.png" -o ./assets/compressed

# Compress files and save as a ZIP archive
slimfile batch "./images/*.jpg" --zip

# Compress files and save ZIP to a specific path
slimfile batch "./images/*.jpg" --zip -o compressed_images.zip

Output:

Found 5 file(s) to compress:
  • ./images/hero.jpg
  • ./images/about.jpg
  • ./images/team.jpg
  • ./images/banner.jpg
  • ./images/logo.png

✔ Batch compression complete
────────────────────────────────────────
  Files:  5 file(s)
  Input:  12.30 MB
  Output: 3.10 MB
  Saved:  9.20 MB (74.8% reduction)

  Extracted to: compressed/

Always wrap glob patterns in quotes to prevent your shell from expanding them before the CLI receives them.

stats

View your API usage statistics. Requires being logged in (slimfile login).

slimfile stats [options]

Options:

| Option | Description | |--------|-------------| | --detailed | Show performance metrics, file type breakdown, and recent activity |

Examples:

# Basic stats
slimfile stats

# Detailed analytics
slimfile stats --detailed

Basic output:

SlimFile Usage Statistics
────────────────────────────────────────
  API Keys:          3
  Requests today:    12
  Files this month:  148
  Total files:       523
  Total saved:       1.23 GB
  Storage saved:     1.23 GB
  Avg compression:   68.4%
  Single compress:   310
  Batch compress:    213

Detailed output adds:

Performance
────────────────────────────────────────
  Avg processing:  320ms
  Fastest:         80ms
  Slowest:         2400ms

By File Type
────────────────────────────────────────
  image         310 files  72.1% avg compression
  pdf            98 files  45.3% avg compression
  pptx           75 files  61.8% avg compression
  docx           40 files  38.2% avg compression

Recent Activity
────────────────────────────────────────
  3/29/2026  hero.jpg                      74.8%  210ms
  3/29/2026  Q1_report.pdf                 42.1%  890ms
  3/28/2026  pitch_deck.pptx               63.4%  1200ms

interactive

Start an interactive menu-driven mode. Useful if you don't want to memorize commands.

slimfile interactive

# Or just run slimfile with no arguments
slimfile

This launches a guided prompt where you can choose what to do:

  ╔═══════════════════════════╗
  ║     SlimFile CLI  v1.0    ║
  ╚═══════════════════════════╝
  Fast file compression for images, PDFs, and Office docs

? What would you like to do?
  📄  Compress a single file
  📦  Batch compress files
  📊  View usage statistics
  ⚙️   Show configuration
  ──────────────
  🚪  Exit

Examples

Compress a product image for a website

slimfile compress hero_image.png --quality 75 -o hero_image_web.jpg

Compress all assets before deploying

slimfile batch "./public/images/*.{jpg,png}" -o ./public/images/compressed

Compress and zip a set of PDFs to send via email

slimfile batch "./reports/*.pdf" --zip -o reports_compressed.zip

Compress a large PowerPoint before sharing

slimfile compress big_presentation.pptx -o big_presentation_small.pptx

Check how much storage you've saved this month

slimfile stats --detailed

Output

By default, compressed files are saved alongside the original with _compressed added to the filename:

| Input | Output | |-------|--------| | photo.jpg | photo_compressed.jpg | | document.pdf | document_compressed.pdf | | report.docx | report_compressed.docx | | photo.png | photo_compressed.jpg (converted to JPEG) |

Use -o to specify a custom output path:

slimfile compress photo.jpg -o optimized/photo.jpg

Configuration File

The CLI stores your API key and session token in:

~/.slimfile/config.json

Example file:

{
  "apiUrl": "https://api.slim-file.com",
  "apiKey": "sk_abc123...",
  "token": "eyJhbGci..."
}

• apiKey — used for all compress and batch commands
• token — your login session, used for the stats command
• apiUrl — the SlimFile API base URL (do not change unless self-hosting)

You can view these values at any time with:

slimfile config show

Error Handling

| Error | Solution | |-------|----------| | No API key set | Run slimfile config set-key YOUR_KEY | | Not logged in | Run slimfile login | | File not found | Check the file path is correct | | Unsupported file type | See Supported Formats | | No files matched | Check your glob pattern — wrap it in quotes | | Compression failed | Check your API key is active in the dashboard | | 401 Unauthorized | Your API key may be expired or revoked |

Updating

To update to the latest version:

npm update -g @slimfile/cli

Check your current version:

slimfile --version

Uninstalling

npm uninstall -g @slimfile/cli

Your config file at ~/.slimfile/config.json is not removed automatically. Delete it manually if needed:

rm -rf ~/.slimfile

Links

• Website: api.slim-file.com
• npm: npmjs.com/package/@slimfile/cli
• Issues: github.com/ikaydreams-dev/slimfile-cli/issues

License

MIT