Explore Redis with CLI

Interact with Redis

External programs talk to Redis using a TCP socket and a Redis specific protocol. This protocol is implemented in the Redis client libraries for the different programming languages. However to make hacking with Redis simpler Redis provides a command line utility that can be used to send commands to Redis. This program is called redis-cli.

The first thing to do in order to check if Redis is working properly is sending a PING command using redis-cli:

$ redis-cli ping
PONG

Running redis-cli followed by a command name and its arguments will send this command to the Redis instance running on localhost at port 6379. You can change the host and port used by redis-cli - just try the --help option to check the usage information.

Another interesting way to run redis-cli is without arguments: the program will start in interactive mode. You can type different commands and see their replies.

$ redis-cli
redis 127.0.0.1:6379> ping
PONG
redis 127.0.0.1:6379> set mykey somevalue
OK
redis 127.0.0.1:6379> get mykey
"somevalue"

At this point you are able to talk with Redis. It is the right time to pause a bit with this tutorial and start the fifteen minutes introduction to Redis data types in order to learn a few Redis commands. Otherwise if you already know a few basic Redis commands you can keep reading.