Short Leash documentation
Short Leash is a local development environment for Mac and Windows, free at its core with a paid Short Leash Pro: it serves PHP, Python, Ruby, Node, Go and static sites at name.test with trusted HTTPS, runs databases and other services, catches mail and dumps, shows what every request did, shares sites on a public URL through Cloudflare, and adds pairing and on-device AI.
It runs on macOS 13 or later and on Windows 10 or 11 (see Short Leash on Windows). Download Short Leash, then follow the install guide. What's free and what Short Leash Pro adds is on Short Leash Pro and licenses.
Start here
- Install Short Leash and run the one-time setup.
- Add your projects: park a folder of projects, or link a single one.
- Open
https://<name>.testin your browser.
What's in the app
The rail on the left has six places, with Settings at the bottom. Debug, Work and Machine list their pages in a column beside the rail, the way a site does, and open on the page you used last.
| Place | What's in it |
|---|---|
| Home | What needs you across all your sites, what's running and how each site has done (Home) |
| Sites | Every project Short Leash serves. Open one for its own pages: Overview, Processes, Terminals, Scratchpads, Tasks, Changes, Calls, its requests, dumps, mail and logs, and its settings (Inside a site) |
| Debug | Requests (every request to every site), the Monitor, Dumps (dump() output, queries with Explain, jobs, views and HTTP calls), Logs, Mail your sites send, and Webhooks (Webhooks) |
| Work | Tasks (Tasks), Notes (Notes), Meetings once meeting notes are on, and Chat (Chat) |
| Pair | Calls with up to three people: talk, share your screen and give control (Pair) |
| Machine | Services (MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Valkey and Redis on macOS or Garnet on Windows, Memcached on macOS, Meilisearch, Typesense on macOS, RustFS, Reverb and mail), Runtimes (PHP, Node, Python, Go, Ruby, Bun and Deno, PHP settings and Xdebug), Backups (Backups) and Tools (regex, JSON, Base64, JWT, timestamps and more) |
| Settings | Appearance, features, startup, notifications, folders, sharing, requests, the Monitor, webhooks, dictation, meeting notes, models, coding assistants (MCP), Pair, apps, terminal, removal and about |
Collapse at the foot of the column, or ⌘\ (Ctrl+\ on Windows), folds it to its icons to give the page more room; each page's name shows when you point at it, and Short Leash remembers the choice. The power rail at the top of the window shows what's running and has the notification bell. Click the running count to see everything that's running in one list and stop any of it. ⌘K finds any site, page or action, ⌘O switches site, and ⌘, opens Settings (Ctrl+K, Ctrl+O and Ctrl+, on Windows).
Turn features off
Settings › Features lists what Short Leash does besides serving sites: Debug, Webhooks, Pair, Tasks and notes, Dictation, Meeting notes, Chat and Backups. Turning one off hides it from the rail and stops its background work: webhooks stop receiving deliveries (their tunnels close until you turn them back on), daily backups don't run, and Pair, dictation and meeting notes run nothing: a Pair call can't be started or joined until Pair is on again. Serving sites is always on. First run asks the same question, What will you use Short Leash for?, with webhooks, dictation and meeting notes off to start; dictation and meeting notes turn on through their own setup.
The menu bar icon shows whether Short Leash is serving, sharing or stopped, and opens a small window with your active sites.
Light and dark
Short Leash follows your computer's light or dark appearance and changes with it. To keep it one way, choose Light or Dark in Settings › Appearance; Match system goes back to following the system. The choice applies to the window and the menu bar popover. This website does the same: pick System, Light or Dark at the top of the docs or at the bottom of the website's other pages.