Kimini

A focused native desktop for Kimi Code — plus a separate Web compatibility app.

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Kimini connects directly to the local Kimi Code daemon, keeps your existing sessions, and gives you a fast GPUI-native coding workspace. Kimini Web stays available as an independent companion for exact compatibility with the daemon-served Web interface.

Choose your app

	Kimini	Kimini Web
Best for	Daily native workflow	Exact Web UI compatibility
Interface	GPUI	Kimi Code Web in the system webview
Connection	Typed REST + WebSocket	Daemon-served Web UI
Renderer	Metal / Vulkan / DirectX	WKWebView / WebKitGTK / WebView2
Browser cost	Human preview only, on demand	System web process family

Install both: they use the same local daemon, authentication, and session data.

Platform status

Platform	Architectures	Current status
macOS 14+	Apple Silicon, Intel	Released; signed Sparkle update channel
Linux	x86_64, ARM64	Portable preview; Debian 12 / Ubuntu 24.04 class runtime
Windows 10/11	x86_64, ARM64	Source probe and packaging ready; target-host qualification pending

Linux archives are built locally through Docker Buildx. Both apps and architectures have been launched from the distributed archives in Debian 12 / Ubuntu 24.04 environments. Both Windows MSVC targets pass a source-level cross probe. Windows release builds still run on Windows: GPUI needs the native toolchain and Windows SDK shader compiler, and ARM64 needs a real Windows ARM64 run.

Why Kimini

• Native where it matters. Conversation, composer, sessions, settings, files, tasks, skills, goals, terminal tabs, and coding surfaces are rendered by GPUI.
• Your Kimi workflow stays intact. Kimini discovers or starts kimi server and consumes its authenticated /api/v1 REST and WebSocket contracts directly.
• Web compatibility remains one app away. Kimini Web preserves the same UI, storage, sessions, and authentication as kimi web.
• One codebase, platform-native rendering. Metal powers macOS, Vulkan powers Linux, and the Windows port uses DirectX; the Web app uses each OS web engine.
• Browser resources are on demand. The native preview is created only when Browser is open. Linux Wayland opens preview/OAuth links in the system browser; X11, macOS, and Windows retain the embedded child view.
• Updates follow the package owner. macOS has signed in-app replacement. The portable native app routes Update to the latest release without privileged self-replacement; Kimini Web users update from Releases.

Compared with a broad agent environment such as Codex, Kimini is purpose-built for people already using Kimi Code: one daemon, one history, and native or Web desktop surfaces. Model quality and unmatched cross-product benchmarks are outside this comparison.

Quick start

Install Kimi Code. On macOS or Linux:

curl -fsSL https://code.kimi.com/kimi-code/install.sh | bash

On Windows, install Git for Windows, then use PowerShell:

irm https://code.kimi.com/kimi-code/install.ps1 | iex

Open a new terminal, run kimi, and enter /login on first launch.

Download the matching app and architecture from Releases:

• macOS: Kimini-<version>-macos-<arch> or Kimini-Web-... (.dmg / .zip)
• Linux preview: Kimini-<version>-linux-<arch>.tar.gz or Kimini-Web-...
• Windows qualification assets: Kimini-<version>-windows-<arch>.zip or Kimini-Web-... once a target-host build has completed

On Linux, install GTK 3, WebKitGTK 4.1, Vulkan, and your desktop portal, then extract the archive and run bin/kimini or bin/kimini-web. A desktop entry and icon are included under share/.

Kimini (Native and Web) reads .kimi-code/server/instances/*.json (kimi-code 0.28+), falls back to legacy server/lock, loads server.token, health-probes candidates, and starts kimi web --no-open when nothing is healthy. The server is shared and detached from the app process. API credentials stay in request headers or the WebSocket subprotocol; the Web shell only passes the local server token in the URL fragment (#token=).

Native experience

The 0.3 line includes session creation, search, rename, archive/restore, fork, compact, undo, attachments, streaming, thinking and tool traces, approvals and questions, runtime modes, files, tasks, skills, goals, side chat, terminal tabs, authentication, English/Chinese UI, themes, and keyboard-first navigation.

Settings, appearance, language, account, and agent defaults

Shortcut	Surface
⌘/Ctrl + Shift + E	Files
⌘/Ctrl + Shift + K	Skills
⌘/Ctrl + J	Terminal
⌘/Ctrl + Shift + T	Tasks

Compatibility and release facts

• Direct daemon integration uses Kimi Code's self-described REST and WebSocket protocols; it does not scrape CLI/TUI output.
• The terminal prefers the daemon backend and retains a local Rust PTY fallback.
• macOS aarch64 app bundles are 17.1 MiB native and 4.8 MiB Web with the updater embedded. Linux ARM64 portable archives are 11.6 MiB and 597 KiB. Archive and app-bundle figures are different package scopes.
• Protocol and pure state logic currently have 97.03% line coverage. The local native/Web suite contains 189 automated tests.

The native app is an early release. Windows packaged-app behavior, Linux distro breadth, CJK composition, long-session performance, streaming accessibility, rich media, and complete interactive terminal behavior remain active hardening areas. Matched CPU and memory results will be published only after full process-family measurements are repeatable on every platform.

Build from source

Rust 1.96+ is required.

make run             # native app on the current host
make run-web         # Web compatibility app
make package-all     # macOS: two apps, two architectures, DMG + zip
make package-linux   # macOS/Linux: x86_64 + ARM64 tarballs via Docker Buildx

From a Visual Studio 2022 Developer PowerShell on Windows:

./scripts/package-windows.ps1 -App all -Arch all

The Windows builder needs the Desktop C++ workload, x64 and ARM64 MSVC tools, Windows 10/11 SDK, Rust targets, and WebView2. The strict local release coordinator can aggregate macOS, Linux, and Windows assets with make publish-release-all; it refuses a partial matrix.

See the platform research, native GUI specification, and framework decision for deeper details.

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Community-built and independent. Kimi and Kimi Code are products of Moonshot AI. Kimini is not affiliated with Moonshot AI.

MIT · Issues · Built with GPUI, gpui-component, wry, and tao, with macOS updates powered by Sparkle.