Install the nh CLI

The nh CLI is a standalone binary that lets you manage your NervesHub organization, devices, firmware, and deployment groups directly from the command line or inside CI/CD pipelines — no Elixir toolchain required. Choose the installation method that fits your operating system and workflow below.

Install Options

macOS / Linux (Homebrew)
Prebuilt binary
From source (Go)

The quickest way to install nh. Homebrew also handles future upgrades.

brew install nerves-hub/tap/nh-cli

To upgrade an existing installation:

brew upgrade nerves-hub/tap/nh-cli

The same tap also carries an older Elixir build of the CLI as nerves-hub/tap/nh, which provides its own nh command. If you have it installed, remove it first so the two do not collide:

brew uninstall nerves-hub/tap/nh

If macOS reports that the nh binary is not trusted after installation, open System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the Security section, and click Open Anyway next to the nh entry. Then re-run nh in your terminal.

Download an archive from the latest release. Archives are named nh_<version>_<os>_<arch>, where os is darwin, linux, or windows, and arch is amd64 or arm64. Windows archives are .zip; everything else is .tar.gz.

Download the release archive

Pick the archive matching your OS and CPU — for example nh_1.2.0_darwin_arm64.tar.gz on Apple Silicon.

Extract the binary

Extract it to a directory of your choice, for example C:\Tools\nh\ on Windows or ~/.local/bin/ on Linux and macOS.

Add to PATH

Add the directory containing the nh (or nh.exe) binary to your system PATH so it is available from any terminal.

Building nh yourself requires Go 1.26.4 or newer.

go install github.com/nerves-hub/nh@latest

Or clone the repository and build it directly:

git clone https://github.com/nerves-hub/nh.git
cd nh
go build -o nh .
mv nh /usr/local/bin/

Verify Installation

After installing, confirm that nh is available and check the installed version:

nh --version

To see top-level help and a summary of all available commands:

nh --help

A successful installation prints the version string, for example:

nh version 0.x.y

Runtime Dependency

Signing and uploading firmware shells out to fwup, which must be on your PATH. No other command needs it, and it is not required when uploading with --skip-signing.

Migrating from the Elixir CLI

If you previously used the Elixir nerves_hub_cli, import its settings once:

nh migrate

This reads that CLI’s data directory (~/.nerves-hub, or $NERVES_HUB_HOME) and copies your saved defaults, API token, and signing keys into nh’s own data directory. It leaves the original files in place, and signing keys are re-encoded rather than decrypted, so no key password is required and password-protected keys keep theirs.

nh is open source under the MIT license. View the source code, report issues, and track releases at github.com/nerves-hub/nh.

​Install Options

​Verify Installation

​Runtime Dependency

​Migrating from the Elixir CLI

Install Options

Verify Installation

Runtime Dependency

Migrating from the Elixir CLI