rsql

A modern, feature-rich command line SQL interface for data

rsql is a powerful and user-friendly command line SQL client that works with over 20 different data sources and formats. Whether you're working with databases, files, or cloud services, rsql provides a consistent and intuitive interface for all your data querying needs.

Highlights

• Universal SQL Interface: Query databases, files, and cloud services with standard SQL
• Rich Interactive Experience: Syntax highlighting, auto-completion, and command history
• Multiple Output Formats: ASCII tables, JSON, CSV, HTML, and more
• Extensive Data Source Support: PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQLite, DuckDB, Parquet, CSV, Excel, and many more
• Compression Support: Automatically handles compressed files (gzip, brotli, etc.)
• Embedded Database: Run PostgreSQL queries without external setup
• Multilingual: Interface available in 40+ languages

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Quick Start

Installation

Linux / MacOS:

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -LsSf https://github.com/theseus-rs/rsql/releases/latest/download/rsql_cli-installer.sh | sh

or Homebrew:

brew install rsql

Windows:

irm https://github.com/theseus-rs/rsql/releases/latest/download/rsql_cli-installer.ps1 | iex

Cargo

cargo install rsql_cli

For detailed installation instructions, visit the rsql documentation.

Basic Usage

Interactive Mode:

# Connect to a database
rsql --url "postgresql://user:pass@localhost/mydb"
Query a CSV file
rsql --url "csv://data.csv"
Use DuckDB for in-memory analytics
rsql --url "duckdb://"

Execute Single Query:

# Run a query and exit
rsql --url "sqlite://database.db" -- "SELECT * FROM users LIMIT 10"
Query a Parquet file
rsql --url "parquet://data.parquet" -- "SELECT column1, COUNT(*) FROM table GROUP BY column1"

Supported Data Sources

Databases

• ClickHouse (clickhouse://)
• CockroachDB (cockroachdb://)
• CrateDB (cratedb://)
• DuckDB (duckdb://) - High-performance analytics
• DynamoDB (dynamodb://)
• LibSQL/Turso (libsql://)
• MySQL / MariaDB (mysql:// / mariadb://)
• PostgreSQL (postgresql:// / postgres://) - Including embedded PostgreSQL
• Redshift (redshift://)
• Snowflake (snowflake://)
• SQL Server (sqlserver://)
• SQLite (sqlite:// / rusqlite://)

File Formats

• Arrow (arrow://) - In-memory columnar format
• Avro (avro://) - Binary serialization format
• CSV/TSV (csv:// / tsv://) - Comma/tab-separated values
• Excel (excel://) - .xlsx and .xls files
• Fixed Width (fwf://) - Fixed-width format
• JSON/JSONL (json:// / jsonl://) - JSON documents
• ODS (ods://) - OpenDocument Spreadsheet
• ORC (orc://) - Optimized row columnar format
• Parquet (parquet://) - Columnar storage format
• XML (xml://) - XML documents
• YAML (yaml://) - YAML documents

Cloud & Remote

• FlightSQL (flightsql://) - Apache Arrow Flight SQL
• HTTP/HTTPS (http:// / https://) - Remote files
• S3 (s3://) - Amazon S3 and S3-compatible storage

Compression

Automatically handles: Gzip, Brotli, Bzip2, LZ4, XZ, Zstd

Common Use Cases

Database Operations

# Connect to PostgreSQL
rsql --url "postgresql://user:pass@localhost/mydb"
Use embedded PostgreSQL (no external setup required)
rsql --url "postgresql://user@localhost/mydb?embedded=true"
SQLite file
rsql --url "sqlite://database.db"

File Analysis

# Analyze CSV data
rsql --url "csv://sales.csv" -- "SELECT region, SUM(revenue) FROM table GROUP BY region"
Query Excel spreadsheet
rsql --url "excel://report.xlsx" -- "SELECT * FROM table WHERE amount > 1000"
Analyze Parquet files
rsql --url "parquet://logs.parquet" -- "SELECT date, COUNT(*) FROM table GROUP BY date"

Data Transformation

# Convert CSV to JSON
rsql --url "csv://input.csv" --format json -- "SELECT * FROM input"
Query compressed files
rsql --url "csv://data.csv.gz" -- "SELECT column1, column2 FROM data"
Combine multiple formats
rsql --url "duckdb://" -- "
SELECT * FROM read_csv_auto('file1.csv')
UNION ALL
SELECT * FROM read_parquet('file2.parquet')
"

Advanced Features

Output Formats

Control output with --format:

• ascii - ASCII table (default)
• csv - Comma-separated values
• html - HTML table
• json - JSON format
• markdown - Markdown table
• xml - XML format
• yaml - YAML format
• And more...

Configuration

# Set default format
rsql --url "sqlite://db.sqlite" --format json
Custom delimiter for CSV output
rsql --url "postgresql://..." --format csv --delimiter ";"
Expanded output for wide tables
rsql --url "..." --format expanded

Examples

File Format Examples

CSV with custom options:

rsql --url "csv://data.csv?has_header=true&skip_rows=1"

Fixed-width file:

rsql --url "fwf://data.txt?widths=10,20,15&headers=id,name,email"

Delimited file with custom separator:

rsql --url "delimited://data.txt?separator=|&has_header=true"

Database Examples

PostgreSQL with SSL:

rsql --url "postgresql://user:pass@localhost/db?sslmode=require"

MySQL with charset:

rsql --url "mysql://user:pass@localhost/db?charset=utf8mb4"

Features

Feature	Description
Data Sources	Arrow, Avro, ClickHouse, CockroachDB, CrateDB, CSV, Delimited, DuckDB, DynamoDB, Excel, FlightSQL, FWF, JSON, JSONL, LibSQL (Turso), MariaDB, MySQL, ODS, ORC, Parquet, PostgreSQL, Redshift, Snowflake, SQLite3, SQL Server, TSV, XML, YAML
Compression	Brotli, Bzip2, Gzip, LZ4, XZ, Zstd
Syntax Highlighting	✅ Full SQL syntax highlighting
Result Highlighting	✅ Color output for better readability
Query Auto-completion	✅ Smart completion for SQL keywords and table names
History	✅ Command history with search
SQL File Execution	✅ Execute .sql files directly
Embedded PostgreSQL	✅ No external PostgreSQL installation required
Output Formats	ascii, csv, expanded, html, json, jsonl, markdown, plain, psql, sqlite, tsv, unicode, xml, yaml
Localized Interface	40+ languages¹
Key Bindings	emacs, vi

¹ Computer translations; human translations welcome

Connection URLs

Driver	URL
arrow (polars)	arrow://<file>
avro (polars)	avro://<file>
brotli¹	brotli://<file>
bzip2¹	bzip2://<file>
clickhouse	clickhouse://<user>[:<password>]@<host>[:<port>]/<database>[?access_token=<token>][&scheme=<http|https>]
cockroachdb (sqlx)	cockroachdb://<user>[:<password>]@<host>[:<port>]/<database>
cratedb (sqlx)	cratedb://<user>[:<password>]@<host>[:<port>]/<database>
csv (polars)	csv://<file>[?has_header=<true|false>][&quote=<char>][&skip_rows=<n>]
delimited (polars)	delimited://<file>[?separator=<char>][&has_header=<true|false>][&quote=<char>][&skip_rows=<n>]
duckdb	duckdb://[<file>]
dynamodb	dynamodb://[<access_key_id>:<secret_access_key>@]<host>[:<port>]>[?region=<region>][&session_token=<token>][&scheme=<http|https>]
excel	excel://<file>[?has_header=<true|false>][&skip_rows=<n>]
file¹	file://<file>
flightsql	flightsql://<user[:password>]@<host>[:<port>][?scheme=<http|https>]
fwf	fwf://<file>?widths=<widths>[&headers=<headers>]
gzip¹	gzip://<file>
http¹	http://<path>[?_headers=<headers>]
https¹	https://<path>[?_headers=<headers>]
json (polars)	json://<file>
jsonl (polars)	jsonl://<file>
libsql²	libsql://<host>?[<memory=true>][&file=<database_file>][&auth_token=<token>]
lz4¹	lz4://<file>
mariadb (sqlx)	mariadb://<user>[:<password>]@<host>[:<port>]/<database>
mysql (sqlx)	mysql://<user>[:<password>]@<host>[:<port>]/<database>
ods	ods://<file>[?has_header=<true|false>][&skip_rows=<n>]
orc	orc://<file>
parquet (polars)	parquet://<file>
postgres	postgres://<user>[:<password>]@<host>[:<port>]/<database>?<embedded=true>
postgresql (sqlx)	postgresql://<user>[:<password>]@<host>[:<port>]/<database>?<embedded=true>
redshift (sqlx)	redshift://<user>[:<password>]@<host>[:<port>]/<database>
rusqlite	rusqlite://[<file>]
s3¹	s3://[<access_key_id>:<secret_access_key>@]<host>[:<port>]/<bucket>/<object>[?region=<region>][&session_token=<token>][&force_path_style=(true|false)][&scheme=<http|https>]
snowflake	snowflake://<user>[:<token>]@<account>.snowflakecomputing.com/[?private_key_file=pkey_file&public_key_file=pubkey_file]
sqlite (sqlx)	sqlite://[<file>]
sqlserver	sqlserver://<user>[:<password>]@<host>[:<port>]/<database>
tsv (polars)	tsv://<file>[?has_header=<true|false>][&quote=<char>][&skip_rows=<n>]
xml	xml://<file>
xz¹	xz://<file>
yaml	yaml://<file>
zstd¹	zstd://<file>

¹ the driver will attempt to detect the type of file and automatically use the appropriate driver.
² libsql needs to be enabled with the libsql feature flag; it is disabled by default as it conflicts with rusqlite.

License

Licensed under either of:

• Apache License, Version 2.0, (LICENSE-APACHE or http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0)
• MIT license (LICENSE-MIT or http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT)

Contributing

Unless you explicitly state otherwise, any contribution intentionally submitted for inclusion in the work by you, as defined in the Apache-2.0 license, shall be dual licensed as above, without any additional terms or conditions.

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Need help? Check out the documentation or open an issue on GitHub.