# Quickstart

> Sign in to moatbox, create a space, start an agent run and connect to the space from your terminal.

This page takes you from no account to an agent running in a moatbox space, with an SSH connection from your own terminal. moatbox is a hosted service at `https://app.moatbox.dev`; a space is a virtual machine where agents run. Background on both is in the [overview](https://docs.moatbox.dev/index.md).

## 1. Sign in

Open `https://app.moatbox.dev`. Pick **Continue with Google**, **Continue with GitHub**, or type your address and press **Email me a magic link**. The emailed link works once and expires after 15 minutes.

While moatbox is invite-only, an address without an invite goes on the waitlist and gets an email once a place opens.

## 2. Create a space

Only team owners and admins can create spaces, and the team needs an active plan.

1. Go to **Spaces** and press **Create space**. The space picker's **+ New space** entry opens the same form.
2. Fill in the form:
   - **Team**: the team that owns the space. The list holds the teams where you are an owner or admin.
   - **Space name**: 3 to 32 characters of `a-z`, `0-9` and `-`, starting and ending with a letter or digit. The name appears in the space's URL and SSH alias.
   - **From**: **A fresh box**, **A saved snapshot**, or **A share code from another team**. See [Snapshots](https://docs.moatbox.dev/snapshots.md) for the last two.
   - **Size**: CPU and memory. Every size has a 50 GB disk. See [Spaces](https://docs.moatbox.dev/spaces.md#sizes).
   - **Environment**: shown when the team has more than one environment. Leave it on the default, or see [Environments](https://docs.moatbox.dev/environments.md).
   - **Auto-stop**: how long the space may sit idle before it sleeps. The default is 10 minutes.
3. Press **Create space**.

The dashboard opens the space at `https://app.moatbox.dev/s/<space>`. Its state reads **Starting** until the machine is up, then **Awake**.

## 3. Start an agent run

1. On the space's **Agents** page, press **New agent**.
2. Pick the agent: Claude Code, Codex or opencode.
3. Type the task in the box ("What should the agent do?"). You can also pick a working directory under `/workspace`, type a branch, or turn on **Screen** to watch the agent's browser.
4. Press **Start**.

The run page opens at `https://app.moatbox.dev/s/<space>/runs/<run>`. If the agent has no credentials in this space yet, follow [Agent sign-in](https://docs.moatbox.dev/agent-sign-in.md) first. Held actions show up on the space's **Approvals** page; see [Approvals](https://docs.moatbox.dev/approvals.md).

## 4. Connect from your terminal

You need macOS (Apple silicon or Intel) or Linux (x86-64 or arm64) for the CLI.

1. On the space's **Overview** page, open **Open in…** and pick **Terminal**.
2. Copy the command under **Set up this computer once** and paste it into your terminal. It looks like this:

   ```sh
   curl -fsSL https://app.moatbox.dev/api/v1/cli.sh | sh -s -- mbx_cli_… my-space
   ```

   The command installs the `moatbox` CLI in `~/.local/bin`, creates `~/.ssh/moatbox_ed25519` if it is missing, signs this computer in, adds the key to your account and writes a `Host moatbox-my-space` block into `~/.ssh/config`. The code inside works once and expires after 15 minutes; press **New command** for a fresh one.
3. Connect:

   ```sh
   ssh moatbox-my-space
   ```

If `~/.local/bin` is not on your `PATH`, the script prints the line to add. The same alias works for `scp`, `sftp` and `rsync`. [Connect to a space](https://docs.moatbox.dev/connect.md) covers the SSH gateway, other editors, every CLI command and Tailscale.

## Next steps

- [Spaces](https://docs.moatbox.dev/spaces.md): sleep, auto-stop, resizing, the trash and forks.
- [Environments](https://docs.moatbox.dev/environments.md): give every new space its repositories, variables and setup script.
- [API keys](https://docs.moatbox.dev/api-keys.md): script moatbox from CI or your own tools.