Mario Zechner pi at a glance
pi is a terminal coding agent built from small MIT-licensed packages: a multi-provider LLM API, an agent loop and a terminal UI. It uses a system prompt and tools under 1,000 tokens, four default tools and no permission prompts. It later powered OpenClaw's agent.
What changed with Mario Zechner pi
On November 30, 2025, Mario Zechner, the creator of the libGDX game framework, published a long post explaining pi, a coding agent he built to keep tight control over exactly what goes into the model's context. The CLI had first appeared on npm on November 12, 2025, as part of his pi-mono repository.
pi is split into layers that can be used on their own: pi-ai, one API for models from Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, xAI, Groq, Cerebras, OpenRouter and any OpenAI-compatible endpoint, with context handoff between providers; pi-agent-core, the agent loop and tool runner; pi-tui, a terminal UI with differential rendering; and pi-coding-agent, the CLI that ties them together.
The design is intentionally small. The system prompt and tool definitions total under 1,000 tokens, and the agent gets four tools by default: read, write, edit and bash. At launch it had no plan mode, to-do lists, sub-agent tool or MCP support, and no permission prompts at all; the project recommends running it in a sandbox or container instead.
Mario Zechner pi in numbers
Values are copied from the linked source on the date shown. They are not IA Compa measurements.
- GitHub stars (earendil-works/pi)as of · Source for GitHub stars (earendil-works/pi): github.com (opens in a new tab)
- 120,337
Where to compare Mario Zechner pi
Independent leaderboards and official resources for comparing this model yourself. Rankings change often; each site shows its own current data.
Why Mario Zechner pi matters for businesses
That lean core made pi a popular base for other agents. OpenClaw's early gateway described itself as running a Pi RPC agent, and Armin Ronacher wrote in January 2026 about pi as the minimal agent inside OpenClaw. For teams, pi shows how little scaffolding a capable model needs, but its full-access default means it should only run where a mistake cannot reach production systems or secrets.
Put it to work: AI Agents
Mario Zechner pi updates since publication
Dated changes since publication. The original article text above is kept as written on its date.
Update (Updated)
Pi reached version 1.0.0.
github.com (opens in a new tab)Update
Pi published four security advisories, including CVE-2026-54328 (high), a local privilege escalation through predictable extension install paths on shared Linux hosts, and CVE-2026-54325 (medium), project extensions loading without approval. Update to 0.79.0 or later under @earendil-works.
github.com (opens in a new tab)Update
OpenClaw merged its own agent runtime and stopped depending on pi's agent packages; it still uses pi's terminal UI library.
github.com (opens in a new tab)Availability
The packages moved to the @earendil-works npm scope, starting with pi-coding-agent 0.74.0. The old @mariozechner/pi-coding-agent package is deprecated and gets no further fixes.
npmjs.com (opens in a new tab)Status
Zechner joined the company Earendil, where he works with Armin Ronacher; Earendil now owns pi and its name. He said the core stays MIT licensed and the repository moved to earendil-works/pi; future add-ons may be Fair Source or proprietary.
mariozechner.at (opens in a new tab)
Sources for this story
- What I learned building an opinionated and minimal coding agent (opens in a new tab)Official
Mario Zechner · mariozechner.at
- Official
- Official
- I've sold out (opens in a new tab)Official
Mario Zechner · mariozechner.at
- Pi security advisories (opens in a new tab)Official
GitHub (earendil-works/pi) · github.com
- Pi: The Minimal Agent Within OpenClaw (opens in a new tab)Press
Armin Ronacher · lucumr.pocoo.org
- OpenClaw Success Puts Spotlight on Pi, a Minimalist AI Coding Agent (opens in a new tab)Press
eWeek · eweek.com
Last verified: . IA Compa summarizes public announcements for business readers. We are not affiliated with the companies mentioned. Always confirm details, pricing, and availability with the official source.
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- #terminal
