Railway CLI

Deploy and manage Railway cloud platform projects.

Installation

bash

brew install railway
# or: npm i -g @railway/cli
# or: bash <(curl -fsSL cli.new)

Authentication

bash

railway login              # Browser-based login
railway login --browserless  # For headless/SSH environments (prints pairing code)
railway logout             # Disconnect from account

Environment Variables for CI/CD:

•RAILWAY_TOKEN - Project token (deploy, redeploy, logs only)
•RAILWAY_API_TOKEN - Account token (full access including init, link)

Project Management

bash

railway init               # Create new project
railway link               # Link current directory to existing project/environment
railway service            # Link to specific service in project
railway environment        # Switch linked environment (default: production)

Deployment

bash

railway up                 # Deploy with build logs
railway up --detach        # Deploy and return immediately (no logs)
railway redeploy           # Redeploy current service

Local Development

bash

railway run <cmd>          # Run command locally with Railway env vars
railway run npm start      # Example: start dev server with Railway vars
railway shell              # Open shell with Railway environment loaded

Logs & Debugging

bash

railway logs               # View service logs
railway ssh                # SSH into running service
railway ssh -- ls          # Execute single command via SSH

SSH with specific target:

bash

railway ssh --project=<ID> --environment=<ID> --service=<ID>

Database & Services

bash

railway add                # Provision database (Postgres, MySQL, Redis, MongoDB)

Common Workflows

Deploy a new project

bash

railway login
railway init
railway up

Link existing project and deploy

bash

railway login
railway link
railway up

Run local dev with production database

bash

railway link
railway run npm run dev

View logs for debugging

bash

railway logs
# or SSH in for interactive debugging
railway ssh

User Invocation

•/railway - Show status and common commands
•/railway deploy - Deploy current directory
•/railway logs - View service logs
•/railway ssh - Connect to service

Agent Response Protocol

For /railway or /railway status:

•Check if logged in: railway whoami
•Check linked project: railway status
•Report current state and suggest next actions

For /railway deploy:

•Verify logged in and linked
•Run railway up and report results
•On failure, suggest fixes

For /railway logs:

•Run railway logs (add --help to see filtering options)
•Summarize recent activity

For /railway ssh:

•Run railway ssh for interactive session
•Or railway ssh -- <command> for one-off commands