Summarize CLI

Fast CLI to summarize URLs, local files, and YouTube links.

Binary: summarize (NOT installed — install via pip install summarize-cli or download binary from https://summarize.sh) Homepage: https://summarize.sh

When to Use

• Summarizing a URL, PDF, or YouTube video
• Need quick content extraction and compression
• Multi-format input (web pages, local files, streaming URLs)

When NOT to Use

• Just need to read/fetch a URL → use web_extract
• Transcribe audio without summarizing → use faster-whisper
• Generate new content → not an extraction tool

Quick Start

summarize "https://example.com" --model google/gemini-3-flash-preview
summarize "/path/to/file.pdf" --model google/gemini-3-flash-preview
summarize "https://youtu.be/VIDEO_ID" --youtube auto

Providers & Keys

• OpenAI: OPENAI_API_KEY
• Anthropic: ANTHROPIC_API_KEY
• xAI: XAI_API_KEY
• Google: GEMINI_API_KEY

Default model: google/gemini-3-flash-preview

Flags

• --length short|medium|long|xl|xxl|<chars> — summary length
• --max-output-tokens <count> — token limit
• --extract-only — just extract content, no summary (URLs only)
• --json — machine readable output
• --firecrawl auto|off|always — fallback extraction
• --youtube auto — YouTube with Apify fallback

Config

Optional: ~/.summarize/config.json

{"model": "openai/gpt-5.2"}

Pitfalls

• ⚠️ NOT currently installed — use pip install summarize-cli or grab binary from https://summarize.sh
• For most URL summarization, Hermes web_extract + delegation is equivalent
• YouTube transcripts: also available via Hermes youtube-content skill

Verification

# Confirm binary is available
which summarize && summarize --version
# Summarize a simple URL
summarize "https://example.com" --length short
# Test with a local file
summarize "/tmp/test.pdf" --extract-only