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What is roam-tui?

avelino/roam-tui — explained in plain English

Analysis updated 2026-05-18

★ 21RustAudience · developerComplexity · 3/5LicenseSetup · easy

In one sentence

A keyboard-driven terminal client for Roam Research that lets you read, edit, and search your notes, plus an MCP server so AI assistants can use them too.

Mindmap

mindmap
  root((roam-tui))
    What it does
      Terminal note editor
      Daily notes view
      Search and backlinks
    Tech stack
      Rust
      MCP
      Roam API
    Use cases
      Terminal note taking
      AI assistant access
      Custom tool building
    Audience
      Roam Research users
      Terminal power users

Code map

Detail Auto

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filefunction / class

What do people build with it?

USE CASE 1

Read, edit, and search Roam Research notes without leaving the terminal.

USE CASE 2

Let an AI assistant like Claude read and write your Roam graph through the built-in MCP server.

USE CASE 3

Build a custom tool against the Roam Research API using the bundled Rust SDK.

USE CASE 4

Quickly capture and review daily notes with vim, emacs, or VS Code style keybindings.

What is it built with?

RustMCPRoam Research API

How does it compare?

avelino/roam-tuidanilaa1/auditkitgnitoahc/remote-ssh.nvim
Stars212121
LanguageRustRustRust
Setup difficultyeasymoderatemoderate
Complexity3/53/53/5
Audiencedeveloperops devopsdeveloper

Figures from each repo's GitHub metadata at analysis time.

How do you get it running?

Difficulty · easy Time to first run · 5min

Requires a Roam Research graph name and API token.

Use freely for any purpose, including commercial use, as long as you keep the copyright notice.

So what is it?

roam-tui is a terminal client for Roam Research, a note-taking application built around linking ideas together. Instead of opening Roam in a web browser, this tool lets you navigate, read, edit, and search your notes entirely from the terminal keyboard. Navigation is keyboard-driven with single-letter shortcuts for common actions like editing a block, creating a new entry, or searching. The tool has three distinct uses. First, it is a visual terminal interface showing your daily notes and pages with collapsible sections, inline formatting, and linked references. Second, it runs as an MCP server, which allows AI assistants like Claude or Cursor to read and write your Roam notes by calling it as a tool. Third, it ships a Rust SDK (library) for developers who want to build their own tools that interact with the Roam Research API. The MCP server exposes 18 tools covering operations like searching pages, retrieving a daily note by date, finding all blocks that reference a given page, creating blocks, updating content, and querying the graph structure. This connects directly to the Roam Research cloud API, so the Roam desktop application does not need to be running. Installation options include npm (via npx), a pre-built binary from crates.io, or Homebrew. You need a Roam graph name and an API token from Roam Research to connect. The project is written in Rust. Documentation is available at an external site linked in the README.

Copy-paste prompts

Prompt 1
Install roam-tui and connect it to my Roam Research graph.
Prompt 2
Set up roam-tui as an MCP server in Claude Desktop so Claude can read my notes.
Prompt 3
Show me how to search my Roam blocks from the roam-tui command line.
Prompt 4
Explain the roam-tui keybindings for editing and navigating a daily note.

Frequently asked questions

What is roam-tui?

A keyboard-driven terminal client for Roam Research that lets you read, edit, and search your notes, plus an MCP server so AI assistants can use them too.

What language is roam-tui written in?

Mainly Rust. The stack also includes Rust, MCP, Roam Research API.

What license does roam-tui use?

Use freely for any purpose, including commercial use, as long as you keep the copyright notice.

How hard is roam-tui to set up?

Setup difficulty is rated easy, with roughly 5min to a first successful run.

Who is roam-tui for?

Mainly developer.

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