Phoenix-Cli

# Phoenix CLI

Invocation

px <resource> <action>                          # if installed globally
npx @arizeai/phoenix-cli <resource> <action>    # no install required

The CLI uses singular resource commands with subcommands like `list` and `get`:

px trace list
px trace get <trace-id>
px trace annotate <trace-id>
px trace add-note <trace-id>
px trace-annotations delete
px span list
px span annotate <span-id>
px span add-note <span-id>
px span-annotations delete
px session list
px session get <session-id>
px session annotate <session-id>
px session add-note <session-id>
px session-annotations delete
px dataset list
px dataset get <name>
px project list
px project get <name>
px annotation-config list
px auth status
px profile list
px profile show [name]
px profile create <name>
px profile use <name>
px profile edit <name>
px profile delete <name>

Setup

export PHOENIX_HOST=http://localhost:6006
export PHOENIX_PROJECT=my-project
export PHOENIX_API_KEY=your-api-key  # if auth is enabled

Always use `--format raw --no-progress` when piping to `jq`.

Quick Reference

| Task | Files |

| ---- | ----- |

| Look at sampled traces, spans, or sessions and write specific notes about what went wrong (no taxonomy yet) | [references/open-coding](references/open-coding.md) |

| Group those notes into a structured failure taxonomy and quantify what matters | [references/axial-coding](references/axial-coding.md) |

Both stages tag every artifact with one shared **coding annotation identifier** (descriptive shape, e.g. `coding-run:chatbot-context-loss-2026-05-06`) so the run is queryable, reversible, and viewable as a unit. Pass `--identifier <value>` explicitly on every `px` call — shell inheritance is unreliable across agent harnesses. Open coding writes notes via `px ... add-note` and records a small local JSONL sidecar at `.px/coding/<sanitized-identifier>.jsonl`; axial coding reads that sidecar as the deterministic handoff and records labels in `.px/coding/<sanitized-identifier>-axial.jsonl`. Pick the identifier once per run (see [references/open-coding.md](references/open-coding.md#coding-annotation-identifier-pick-this-first)), then share the Phoenix UI link from the wrap-up section. Revert is opt-in and runs three identifier-bound DELETEs only after explicit user confirmation.

> **Workflow term vs. server annotation name.** The skill prose calls this value the **coding annotation identifier** (shell-variable hint: `CODING_ANNOTATION_IDENTIFIER`). The server-side annotation NAME used for the UI filter is unchanged — `coding_session_id` — for data compatibility with rows already written by previous runs. Don't try to rename the server-side annotation; treat the asymmetry as load-bearing.

Workflows

**"What do I do after instrumenting?" / "Where do I focus?" / "What's going wrong?"**

[open-coding](references/open-coding.md) → [axial-coding](references/axial-coding.md) → build evals for the top categories.

Reference Categories

| Prefix | Description |

| ------ | ----------- |

| `references/open-coding` | Free-form notes against sampled traces, spans, or sessions — reach for it whenever the user wants to make sense of LLM traffic but has no failure categories yet. Includes a unit-of-analysis diagnostic so the workflow runs at the level the failure modes actually live at (trace for stateless single-shot calls, session for multi-turn agents, span for mechanical/in-isolation failures). |

| `references/axial-coding` | Inductive grouping of notes into a MECE taxonomy with counts — reach for it whenever the user has observations and needs categories or eval targets |

Auth

px auth status                                # check connection and authentication
px auth status --endpoint http://other:6006   # check a specific endpoint
px auth status --profile staging              # check a named profile's connection

Profiles

Named profiles let you switch between multiple Phoenix