---
title: Upgrade
description: How to upgrade CowAgent
---

## Recommended: One-line upgrade

Use `cow update` to pull the latest code and restart the service in one step:

```bash
cow update
```

The command runs the following automatically:

1. Pull the latest code (`git pull`)
2. Stop the running service
3. Update Python dependencies
4. Reinstall the CLI
5. Start the service

<Note>
  If the Cow CLI is not installed, `./run.sh update` performs the same operations.
</Note>

## Manual upgrade

Run the following inside the project root:

```bash
git pull
pip3 install -r requirements.txt
pip3 install -e .
```

Then restart the service:

```bash
# Using Cow CLI (recommended)
cow restart

# Or using run.sh
./run.sh restart

# Or restart manually with nohup
kill $(ps -ef | grep app.py | grep -v grep | awk '{print $2}')
nohup python3 app.py & tail -f nohup.out
```

## Docker upgrade

Run the following in the directory containing `docker-compose.yml`:

```bash
sudo docker compose pull
sudo docker compose up -d
```

<Tip>
  Back up `config.json` before upgrading. For Docker deployments, mount the workspace directory as a volume to persist data across upgrades.
</Tip>

## Desktop client upgrade

The [desktop client](/guide/desktop) has built-in auto-update: it checks for new versions automatically and prompts you, so you can download and restart to upgrade in one click.

You can also grab the latest version anytime from the [download page](https://cowagent.ai/download/).
