# Give your agent access to OpenMetal (/get-started/agents)



OpenMetal gives coding agents one safe interface for compute across sandbox providers. The skill teaches the exact workflow. The CLI performs it.

## Before you begin [#before-you-begin]

1. [Create an OpenMetal account](https://www.openmetal.sh/login) and complete sign in.
2. Use a trusted terminal with Node.js 22 or later.
3. Have a place to store the project API key that OpenMetal shows once.

The guided CLI setup selects or creates your organization and project, then creates the project key.
You can also complete those steps in the [OpenMetal dashboard](https://www.openmetal.sh/dashboard)
before installing the agent tools.

## Install the agent skill [#install-the-agent-skill]

Add OpenMetal to any client that supports the Agent Skills specification:

```bash
npx skills add superagent-ai/openmetal --skill openmetal
```

The skill works with Cursor, Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, and other compatible agents.

## Install the CLI [#install-the-cli]

```bash
npm install --global @openmetal/cli
openmetal --help
```

Run initial setup yourself in a trusted terminal:

```bash
openmetal setup
openmetal doctor
```

<Callout type="warn" title="Keep the one time key private">
  Setup creates and prints a project API key once. Do not ask an agent to run this step when its
  terminal output is recorded.
</Callout>

## Ask your agent [#ask-your-agent]

Once setup succeeds, give your agent a task such as:

```text
Use OpenMetal to create a temporary Node.js sandbox with 2 vCPUs and 4 GiB
of memory. Upload this project, run the tests, report the result, and destroy
the sandbox when finished.
```

The skill instructs the agent to:

1. Check credentials without printing their values.
2. Create short lived capacity with an explicit runtime timeout.
3. Persist sandbox and operation IDs.
4. Wait for asynchronous work instead of assuming HTTP 202 means success.
5. Clean up temporary resources.

## Use it in automation [#use-it-in-automation]

```bash
openmetal --json --no-input sandbox create \
  --environment metal/node \
  --environment-version latest \
  --vcpu 2 \
  --memory-mb 4096 \
  --runtime-timeout 1800 \
  --async
```

<Cards>
  <Card title="Agent skill reference" href="/sdk-and-cli/agent-skill" />

  <Card title="CLI quickstart" href="/get-started/cli" />

  <Card title="Run a process" href="/guides/run-process" />

  <Card title="Handle failures" href="/errors/common-errors" />
</Cards>