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Official Bitwarden cli client

  • GitHub
  • CLI docs
  • Very slow, see performance table below
    • time bw --help takes > 1 sec

Install

Generic:

cd /tmp/
wget 'https://vault.bitwarden.com/download/?app=cli&platform=linux' -O bw.zip
unzip bw.zip
mv bw /usr/local/bin

Arch / Manjaro:

sudo pacman -S bitwarden-cli

Debian:

apt update
apt-get install mise
mise use -g bitwarden

Alpine container

After installing libstdc++ and libgcc alpine packages I can't get further than:

Error relocating /root/.local/share/mise/installs/bitwarden/2024.10.0/bin/bw: fcntl64: symbol not found

Configure

  • config file at ~/.config/Bitwarden\ CLI/data.json

Configure endpoint:

bw config server bw.example.com

Export env vars by adding them to ~/.config/shell/common/env_local, i.e. BW_ORG:

bw list organizations

Usage

Login:

Logging in with email and password is recommended for interactive sessions

bw login

Unlock safe:

bw unlock
export BW_SESSION="…"

List personal items:

bw list items

Get item by id:

bw get item de08464b-b2c5-4564-8ed3-213110bc9a6c

Collections

If you are trying to perform user management on your organization, you won’t be able to use the BW CLI. The CLI is designed to work with your vault contents, but user management or other organizational management tasks must be performed using the web vault interface, and cannot be accomplished using the Bitwarden app, browser extension, or CLI.

List org-collections:

bw list --pretty --organizationid $BW_ORG org-collections

Get org-collections template:

bw get template org-collection --pretty

Backup / export

  • The UI client can only export personal items, not organisation items.
  • Backup/export organisation vault
  • None of the export methods export the personal folders where the items are stored.

csv

Important: CSV-export doesn't always export all items, without any notice !! I exported my test-vault (5 items) to json and csv: The json file contained all entries, while the csv file only contained 2 !

CSV-Format:

collections,type,name,notes,fields,reprompt,login_uri,login_username,login_password,login_totp

bw export --organizationid $BW_ORG --output ~/backups/bitwarden/ --format csv

Json

Json export contains much more details, like:

  • collections
  • passwordHistory
  • revisionDate
  • creationDate
  • deletedDate
  • id
  • organizationId
  • folderId
  • type (integer: probably login, card, identity etc.)
  • favorite
  • collectionIds
bw export --organizationid $BW_ORG --output ~/backups/bitwarden/ --format json

Issues

Other

Performance

Comparism of time spent fetching a password:

Tool milliseconds
bw 3689
rbw 11
gopass 26