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Create a root key with the permissions listed on this page under Root Keys in the dashboard sidebar. CLI commands can instead use a session from unkey login with the required permissions. See Permission reference for every permission.
Create or update variables of an in one atomic request. By default, each variable you send is created or overwritten, and variables you don’t mention stay as they are. So you can change one secret without resending the others.
  • --prune deletes every variable you didn’t send. --prune --variables='[]' removes them all.
  • kind defaults to writeonly, which can never be read back. Set "kind":"recoverable" so unkey environments variables list can return the value.
Values are encrypted at rest.

Usage

Flags

string
required
App ID or slug.
string
required
Environment ID or slug.
string
required
ID or slug. Both forms resolve to the same project.
boolean
default:"false"
Delete every variable not present in --variables after the upsert.
string
required
JSON array of at most 50 variables, each with key and value and optionally kind and description, for example [{"key":"TOKEN","value":"secret"}]. A key must be a POSIX shell name of at most 256 characters and may appear only once. A value is capped at 16384 UTF-8 bytes, and a description at 255 characters. All variables in the environment together are capped at 512 KiB. A request that would exceed it fails with 400 and saves nothing.

Shared flags

Every resource command accepts these; CLI output and shared flags describes them in full.
string
A JSON document sent as the request body instead of building it from the flags above. It is mutually exclusive with the request-building flags, and unknown fields are rejected locally. See Send a raw body.
string
Root key used for the request. Falls back to UNKEY_ROOT_KEY, then stored credentials, including a CLI session. See CLI authentication for the full precedence order.
string
default:"https://api.unkey.com"
Base URL of the API. Falls back to UNKEY_API_BASE_URL. You don’t normally need to set it.
string
default:"~/.unkey/config.toml"
Path of the TOML config file. Falls back to UNKEY_CONFIG. An explicit --config takes precedence over a stored CLI session. Browser login stores a session, not a root key in this file. See CLI authentication.
enum
default:"human"
Use human (default) for name-first summary tables and single-response trees, or json for the unchanged full response envelope, including all fields and pagination. Trees wrap long values without truncation. Terminal tables use relative timestamps and may shorten display names and descriptions, but never identifiers, slugs, or credentials. Redirected human output keeps complete values and uses RFC3339 UTC timestamps. Falls back to UNKEY_OUTPUT; other values are rejected. --json also selects JSON output. Add --debug to print the request ID to stderr. See Output formats.
boolean
Print the successful response’s request ID to stderr, separate from stdout.
boolean
Print the full response as JSON. Takes precedence over a valid --output or UNKEY_OUTPUT value.

Required permissions

Your root key needs write on the environment’s variable collection:
With --prune, it also needs delete on the same collection:
Replace the placeholders with resource IDs, not slugs. See Root key permissions for wildcard scopes. If your key can read the variables but lacks a required permission, the API returns 403 and the CLI prints Permission denied: followed by the detail. If your key cannot read the variables, the API hides the permission denial with the same 404 error as a missing environment.

Examples

Set one variable:
Replace the whole set:
Send the request body as JSON:

API endpoint

The command calls POST /v2/environments.setEnvironmentVariables and prints its response. The request fields carry the same names as the flags in camelCase, which is the shape --body expects.

Environment variables

Kinds, encryption, and how variables reach a deployment.
Last modified on November 12, 2026