Installation

The fastest way to install Rewire — detects your OS and architecture, downloads the latest binaries, and installs them to ~/.local/bin.

curl -fsSL https://rewire.run/install.sh | sh

That target is a directory you own, so later upgrades never need sudo. The script tells you which line to add to your shell profile when ~/.local/bin is not on your PATH. Override the location with INSTALL_DIR, keeping in mind that a root-owned directory makes every upgrade require sudo.

curl -fsSL https://rewire.run/install.sh | INSTALL_DIR=/usr/local/bin sh

The script installs the latest release unless you name one. Set REWIRE_VERSION to pin a specific version, which is the way back to a known-good build if a release regresses on your setup.

curl -fsSL https://rewire.run/install.sh | REWIRE_VERSION=0.9.1 sh

When an older copy of rewire comes first on your PATH, the script warns that it shadows the new install and prints how to clear it. Re-running with REWIRE_REMOVE_SHADOWED=1 removes that copy for you.

If you use pixi, install Rewire from our channel:

pixi global install -c https://prefix.dev/rewire rewire

Add the Rewire APT repository and install via apt:

curl -fsSL https://apt.rewire.run/key.gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/rewire.gpg
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/rewire.gpg] https://apt.rewire.run stable main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/rewire.list
sudo apt update && sudo apt install rewire

Run Rewire without installing anything:

nix run github:rewire-run/rewire

Add it to a NixOS or nix-darwin configuration by taking the flake as an input:

{
  inputs.rewire.url = "github:rewire-run/rewire";

  # then, in a module
  environment.systemPackages = [ rewire.packages.x86_64-linux.default ];
}

The flake also exposes overlays.default, which puts rewire on pkgs. Rewire is unfree, so the overlay route needs nixpkgs.config.allowUnfree = true in your own configuration — the packages output already allows it, so nix run and nix profile need nothing.

For an imperative install, nix profile add github:rewire-run/rewire.

The flake repacks the published release archives rather than building from source, so it installs the same binaries every other method does. aarch64-linux, x86_64-linux and aarch64-darwin are covered.

rewire upgrade

Both rewire and rewire-viewer are updated, and neither needs sudo when they live in a directory you own.

If an earlier version installed rewire into /usr/local/bin, run the relocation once — without sudo — to move both binaries into ~/.local/bin. An install placed there cannot move itself, so it keeps asking for sudo on every upgrade until you do.

rewire upgrade --relocate

Move the flake input to the latest release, then rebuild:

nix flake update rewire

For an imperative install, nix profile upgrade rewire.

rewire uninstall

Both binaries go, along with the version cache kept beside them. Your config file and logs stay where they are, so reinstalling later lands on the settings you had. Add --purge to remove those too, and -y to skip the confirmation prompt — see rewire uninstall.

Drop it from environment.systemPackages and rebuild. For an imperative install:

nix profile remove rewire