Perplexity

Use Perplexity’s online models for real-time web search-augmented responses. Models with built-in internet access.

Perplexity’s online models have built-in internet access and return grounded answers with citations. Unlike standard LLMs, they can answer questions about current events.

Supported Models

Model	ID	Context	Web Search	Notes
Sonar Huge	llama-3.1-sonar-huge-128k-online	128K	Yes	Best quality
Sonar Large	llama-3.1-sonar-large-128k-online	128K	Yes	Balanced
Sonar Small	llama-3.1-sonar-small-128k-online	128K	Yes	Fastest/cheapest

Setup

1. Get an API key

   Sign up at perplexity.ai and go to API settings.

2. Set the environment variable

   export PERPLEXITY_API_KEY=pplx-...
   
3. Verify

   profclaw doctor --provider perplexity
   

Environment Variables

PERPLEXITY_API_KEY · string · required

Your Perplexity API key. Format: pplx-...

Configuration Example

.env

PERPLEXITY_API_KEY=pplx-...

settings.yml

providers:
  perplexity:
    api_key: "${PERPLEXITY_API_KEY}"

Model Aliases

Alias	Model
perplexity	llama-3.1-sonar-huge-128k-online
pplx-fast	llama-3.1-sonar-small-128k-online

Usage Examples

CLI

# Current events / web search
profclaw chat --model perplexity "What are the latest changes to the TypeScript spec?"

# Fast web lookup
profclaw chat --model pplx-fast "Current Node.js LTS version?"

Notes

• Status: Beta - Perplexity models have unique behavior (web search, citations) that differs from standard chat models.
• API endpoint: https://api.perplexity.ai (OpenAI-compatible)
• All Sonar Online models have real-time internet access built in.
• Responses include source citations automatically.
• Not recommended for tasks requiring deterministic, non-web outputs.

Related

• AI Providers Overview - Compare all 37 supported providers
• Web Search Tool - Explicit web search for any provider via Brave, Serper, or Tavily
• xAI / Grok - Another provider with real-time data access
• profclaw provider - Add and test providers from the CLI