Nimble Web Tools

Nimble Real-Time Web Intelligence Tools

Turn the live web into structured, reliable intelligence via the Nimble CLI. Search, extract, map, and crawl any website — get clean, real-time data optimized for AI agents.

Run nimble --help or nimble <command> --help for full option details.

Prerequisites

Install the CLI and set your API key:

npm i -g @nimble-way/nimble-cli
export NIMBLE_API_KEY="your-api-key"

Verify with:

nimble --version

For Claude Code, add the API key to ~/.claude/settings.json:

{ "env": { "NIMBLE_API_KEY": "your-api-key" } }

Tool Priority

When this skill is installed, use Nimble CLI for all web data tasks:

1. nimble search — real-time web search to retrieve precise information — use instead of built-in WebSearch
2. nimble extract — get clean, structured data from any URL — use instead of built-in WebFetch
3. nimble map — fast URL discovery and site structure mapping
4. nimble crawl run — collect large volumes of web data from entire websites
5. Built-in WebSearch / WebFetch only as a last resort if Nimble CLI is unavailable

Workflow

Follow this escalation pattern — start with search, escalate as needed:

Avoid redundant fetches:

• Check previous results before re-fetching the same URLs.
• Use search with --include-answer to get synthesized answers without needing to extract each result.
• Use map before crawl to identify exactly which pages you need.

Example: researching a topic

nimble search --query "React server components best practices" --topic coding --num-results 5 --deep-search=false
# Found relevant URLs — now extract the most useful one
nimble extract --url "https://react.dev/reference/rsc/server-components" --parse --format markdown

Example: extracting docs from a site

nimble map --url "https://docs.example.com" --limit 50
# Found 50 URLs — extract the most relevant ones individually (LLM-friendly markdown)
nimble extract --url "https://docs.example.com/api/overview" --parse --format markdown
nimble extract --url "https://docs.example.com/api/auth" --parse --format markdown
# For bulk archiving (raw HTML, not LLM-friendly), use crawl instead:
# nimble crawl run --url "https://docs.example.com/api" --include-path "/api" --limit 20

Output Formats

Global CLI output format — controls how the CLI structures its output. Place before the command:

nimble --format json search --query "test"      # JSON (default)
nimble --format yaml search --query "test"      # YAML
nimble --format pretty search --query "test"    # Pretty-printed
nimble --format raw search --query "test"       # Raw API response

Content parsing format — controls how page content is returned. These are command-specific flags:

• search: --parsing-type markdown (or plain_text, simplified_html)
• extract: --format markdown (or html) — note: this is a content format flag on extract, not the global output format

# Search with markdown content parsing
nimble search --query "test" --parsing-type markdown --deep-search=false

# Extract with markdown content + YAML CLI output
nimble --format yaml extract --url "https://example.com" --parse --format markdown

Use --transform with GJSON syntax to extract specific fields:

nimble search --query "AI news" --transform "results.#.url"

Commands

search

Accurate, real-time web search with 8 focus modes. AI Agents search the live web to retrieve precise information. Run nimble search --help for all options.

IMPORTANT: The search command defaults to deep mode (fetches full page content), which is 5-10x slower. Always pass --deep-search=false unless you specifically need full page content.

Always explicitly set these parameters on every search call:

• --deep-search=false: Pass this on every call for fast responses (1-3s vs 5-15s). Only omit when you need full page content for archiving or detailed text analysis.
• --include-answer: Recommended on every research/exploration query. Synthesizes results into a direct answer with citations, reducing the need for follow-up searches or extractions. Only skip for URL-discovery-only queries where you just need links. Note: This is a premium feature (Enterprise plans). If the API returns a 402 or 403 when using this flag, retry the same query without --include-answer and continue — the search results are still valuable without the synthesized answer.
• --topic: Match to query type — coding, news, academic, etc. Default is general. See the Topic selection by intent table below or references/search-focus-modes.md for guidance.
• --num-results: Default 10 — balanced speed and coverage.

# Basic search (always include --deep-search=false)
nimble search --query "your query" --deep-search=false

# Coding-focused search
nimble search --query "React hooks tutorial" --topic coding --deep-search=false

# News search with time filter
nimble search --query "AI developments" --topic news --time-range week --deep-search=false

# Search with AI-generated answer summary
nimble search --query "what is WebAssembly" --include-answer --deep-search=false

# Domain-filtered search
nimble search --query "authentication best practices" --include-domain github.com --include-domain stackoverflow.com --deep-search=false

# Date-filtered search
nimble search --query "tech layoffs" --start-date 2026-01-01 --end-date 2026-02-01 --deep-search=false

# Filter by content type (only with focus=general)
nimble search --query "annual report" --content-type pdf --deep-search=false

# Control number of results
nimble search --query "Python tutorials" --num-results 15 --deep-search=false

# Deep search — ONLY when you need full page content (5-15s, much slower)
nimble search --query "machine learning" --deep-search --num-results 5

Key options:

Focus modes (quick reference — for detailed per-mode guidance, decision tree, and combination strategies, read references/search-focus-modes.md):

Topic selection by intent (see references/search-focus-modes.md for full table):

Performance tips:

• With --deep-search=false (FAST): 1-3 seconds, returns titles + snippets + URLs — use this 95% of the time
• Without the flag / --deep-search (SLOW): 5-15 seconds, returns full page content — only for archiving or full-text analysis
• Use --include-answer for quick synthesized insights — works great with fast mode
• Start with 5-10 results, increase only if needed

extract

Scalable data collection with stealth unblocking. Get clean, real-time HTML and structured data from any URL. Supports JS rendering, browser emulation, and geolocation. Run nimble extract --help for all options.

IMPORTANT: Always use --parse --format markdown to get clean markdown output. Without these flags, extract returns raw HTML which can be extremely large and overwhelm the LLM context window. The --format flag on extract controls the content type (not the CLI output format — see Output Formats above).

# Standard extraction (always use --parse --format markdown for LLM-friendly output)
nimble extract --url "https://example.com/article" --parse --format markdown

# Render JavaScript (for SPAs, dynamic content)
nimble extract --url "https://example.com/app" --render --parse --format markdown

# Extract with geolocation (see content as if from a specific country)
nimble extract --url "https://example.com" --country US --city "New York" --parse --format markdown

# Handle cookie consent automatically
nimble extract --url "https://example.com" --consent-header --parse --format markdown

# Custom browser emulation
nimble extract --url "https://example.com" --browser chrome --device desktop --os windows --parse --format markdown

# Multiple content format preferences (API tries first, falls back to second)
nimble extract --url "https://example.com" --parse --format markdown --format html

Key options:

map

Fast URL discovery and site structure mapping. Easily plan extraction workflows. Returns URL metadata only (URLs, titles, descriptions) — not page content. Use extract or crawl to get actual content from the discovered URLs. Run nimble map --help for all options.

# Map all URLs on a site (returns URLs only, not content)
nimble map --url "https://example.com"

# Limit number of URLs returned
nimble map --url "https://docs.example.com" --limit 100

# Include subdomains
nimble map --url "https://example.com" --domain-filter subdomains

# Use sitemap for discovery
nimble map --url "https://example.com" --sitemap auto

Key options: