railway ca

Browse your projects, launch cloud agents, and connect to the sessions running on them.

The ca command requires cloud agents to be enabled for your account through Priority Boarding. It's under active development, and its commands and flags may change in breaking ways.

Usage

railway ca [COMMAND] [OPTIONS]

Running railway ca with no arguments opens the terminal interface. Passing any launch option skips it and launches directly, the same as railway code. Railway also skips the interface when stdout isn't a terminal, so scripts get the launcher.

Subcommands

Subcommand	Description
`setup`	Configure the default project, coding agent, skills sync, and theme
`start`	Launch a cloud agent without opening the interface

Options

These options apply to railway ca and railway ca start, and are the same ones railway code takes.

Option	Description
`--claude`	Launch Claude Code
`--codex`	Launch Codex
`--grok`	Launch Grok CLI
`--new`	Create a fresh agent instead of reusing this environment's
`--keep-awake`	Leave the agent running on disconnect instead of sleeping it
`--rm`	Destroy this environment's agent and exit
`--refresh-auth`	Re-mint the Claude credential on an agent that already has one
`--name <NAME>`	Name a newly created agent
`--variable <KEY=VALUE>`	Set a variable on a newly created agent (repeatable)
`--env-file <PATH>`	Load variables from a `.env` file (repeatable)
`-p`, `--project <PROJECT>`	Project ID
`-e`, `--environment <ENVIRONMENT>`	Environment name or ID

With no agent option, railway ca launches the coding agent saved by railway ca setup. Set RAILWAY_CA_AGENT to override the saved agent for one run.

Configure cloud agents

railway ca setup asks where agents run, which coding agent to launch, whether to sync your skills, and which theme to draw with, then writes the answers to ~/.railway/agent-prefs.json. See the cloud agents quick start for a walkthrough.

Option	Description
`-y`, `--yes`	Skip the prompts. Keeps existing preferences, and otherwise picks the first detected agent with skills sync off. Railway engages this when stdout isn't a terminal
`--show`	Print the saved preferences and exit

Running railway ca on a machine with no preferences opens the same flow.

The interface

The menu offers three actions, a prompt to describe a task, and the target project the prompt lands in.

Action	Description
New Session	Start another session on an agent you already have
New Cloud Agent	Create a machine in the target project
Manage Cloud Agents	Open the tree of projects, agents, and sessions

Typing a task into the prompt and pressing enter launches an agent with that task. Press ^t to change the target project, which also updates the default saved by setup.

Note: New Session asks which agent to use when the target holds more than one. When the target holds none, it says so rather than creating a machine, which is what New Cloud Agent is for.

Keys

Press ? for the full list. The keys below act on whatever the cursor is on.

Key	Does
`↑` `↓`	Move up and down
`→` `←`	Open and close a row
`enter`	Open a row, or connect to a session and type in it
`shift+esc` or `^]`	Stop typing in a session
`n`	Start a session on an agent, or an agent on a project
`x`	End the session
`s`	Sleep the agent
`w`	Wake the agent
`d`	Delete the agent, after a confirmation
`c`	Copy an SSH command for the session
`r`	Refresh
`t`	Set the prompt's target
`⌥f`	Give the session the whole screen, and restore the tree when pressed again
`shift+enter`	Leave the interface and connect to the session full screen
`⌥t`	Cycle the color theme
`⌥s`	Open setup
`esc`	Return to the menu
`^c`	Quit

Mouse

Click a menu card to open it, or the prompt box to type in it. In the tree, click a row to select it and double-click a session to connect.

In a connected session, the wheel scrolls the agent's output and clicking a link opens it in your browser. Drag to select text, which copies it when you release.

When the coding agent handles the mouse itself, clicks reach the agent so its own clickable output works. This starts once the pane has the keyboard, so the click that focuses a pane stays with the interface. Hold shift while dragging to select text instead.

Examples

Open the interface

railway ca

Configure cloud agents

railway ca setup

Print your preferences

railway ca setup --show

Launch without the interface

railway ca start --claude

Launch a fresh agent

railway ca start --codex --new

Launch into a specific environment

railway ca start --claude --project 5a4b3c2d-1e0f-4a5b-8c7d-6e5f4a3b2c1d --environment production

--project takes a project ID. --environment takes a name or an ID.