Gemini CLI Cheat Sheet — Google's free-tier card

Google entered the terminal-agent race with two strong cards: the tool is fully open-source (Apache 2.0 on GitHub), and the free tier is market-breaking — sign in with a regular Google account and work free within generous daily limits. Plus a third card: a giant context window that swallows whole projects in one breath.

Install & run

Command	What it does
npm install -g @google/gemini-cli	Install (Node 20+)
gemini	Open the session — first run asks for Google sign-in
gemini -p "your prompt"	Non-interactive mode
gemini --yolo	Auto-approve all actions (sandbox only!)

Inside the session

Command	What it does
/help	All commands
/chat save <tag>	Save the conversation under a tag
/chat resume <tag>	Resume a saved conversation
/memory	Manage memory (GEMINI.md)
/stats	Session stats — tokens and usage
/mcp	Connected MCP servers
/tools	Available tools
/compress	Compress context via summarization
!command	Run a shell command directly
/quit	Quit

The verdict

Best use: getting started and exploration. If you're new to coder agents and don't want to spend a cent, this free tier is the lowest entry barrier in the market. And when huge context matters — analyzing a large codebase in one pass — it genuinely shines. Once you're fluent, come back and compare with the rest to see what deserves your money.