PIP-HELP(1)

💖 PIP-HELP(1) — pip's lil help desk 💖

okay bestie, welcome to pip-help, from the pip manual, section 1 (that's "user commands", iykyk). this is the page about the command that tells you about the other commands. yes it's meta. yes it ate. 🫶

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✨ NAME ✨

pip-help — the whole description of the pip help command, no gatekeeping 💅

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🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

Show help for commands. that's it, that's the job, and honestly? she does it flawlessly. 🎀

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🦋 USAGE 🦋

python -m pip help <command>

run that when you're like "wait what does this even do" and pip will simply tell you. main character behavior. ⭐

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👑 OPTIONS 👑

every single one, bestie, we don't skip. and every one of these has an environment variable twin (the env var is basically the option's secret identity 🧚), so i'm listing those too.

• -h, --help — Show help. yes, the help command has a help flag. recursive queen. 💖
  • (environment variable: PIP_HELP)
• --debug — Let unhandled exceptions propagate outside the main subroutine, instead of logging them to stderr. messy on purpose, and that's the point 😭
  • (environment variable: PIP_DEBUG)
• --isolated — Run pip in an isolated mode, ignoring environment variables and user configuration. no outside voices, just vibes. 🙈
  • (environment variable: PIP_ISOLATED)
• --require-virtualenv — Allow pip to only run in a virtual environment; exit with an error otherwise. so if you're not in a venv, she's leaving. periodt. 💀
  • (environment variable: PIP_REQUIRE_VIRTUALENV, PIP_REQUIRE_VENV)
• --python <python> — Run pip with the specified Python interpreter.
  • (environment variable: PIP_PYTHON)
• -v, --verbose — Give more output. Option is additive, and can be used up to 3 times. stack it like a limited edition collab ✨
  • (environment variable: PIP_VERBOSE)
• -V, --version — Show version and exit. (capital V bestie, lowercase -v is a whole different girl)
  • (environment variable: PIP_VERSION)
• -q, --quiet — Give less output. Option is additive, and can be used up to 3 times (corresponding to WARNING, ERROR, and CRITICAL logging levels). shush era 🤫
  • (environment variable: PIP_QUIET)
• --log <path> — Path to a verbose appending log.
  • (environment variable: PIP_LOG, PIP_LOG_FILE, PIP_LOCAL_LOG)
• --no-input — Disable prompting for input. no pop quiz, we're just going. 🍓
  • (environment variable: PIP_NO_INPUT)
• --keyring-provider <keyring_provider> — Enable the credential lookup via the keyring library if user input is allowed. Specify which mechanism to use [auto, disabled, import, subprocess]. (default: auto)
  • (environment variable: PIP_KEYRING_PROVIDER)
• --proxy <proxy> — Specify a proxy in the form scheme://[user:passwd@]proxy.server:port.
  • (environment variable: PIP_PROXY)
• --retries <retries> — Maximum attempts to establish a new HTTP connection. (default: 5) she's persistent, ngl 🔥
  • (environment variable: PIP_RETRIES)
• --timeout <sec> — Set the socket timeout (default 15 seconds).
  • (environment variable: PIP_TIMEOUT, PIP_DEFAULT_TIMEOUT)
• --exists-action <action> — Default action when a path already exists: (s)witch, (i)gnore, (w)ipe, (b)ackup, (a)bort. pick your fighter 🥊
  • (environment variable: PIP_EXISTS_ACTION)
• --trusted-host <hostname> — Mark this host or host:port pair as trusted, even though it does not have valid or any HTTPS.

fr fr, that's the whole point of this flag — you're saying "yeah ik there's no valid HTTPS here, i trust it anyway". only do that for hosts you actually trust, bestie, don't be reckless. 💅

• (environment variable: PIP_TRUSTED_HOST)

• --cert <path> — Path to PEM-encoded CA certificate bundle. If provided, overrides the default. See 'SSL Certificate Verification' in pip documentation for more information.
  • (environment variable: PIP_CERT)
• --client-cert <path> — Path to SSL client certificate, a single file containing the private key and the certificate in PEM format.
  • (environment variable: PIP_CLIENT_CERT)
• --cache-dir <dir> — Store the cache data in <dir>.
  • (environment variable: PIP_CACHE_DIR)
• --no-cache-dir — Disable the cache.
  • (environment variable: PIP_NO_CACHE_DIR)
• --disable-pip-version-check — Don't periodically check PyPI to determine whether a new version of pip is available for download. Implied with --no-index.
  • (environment variable: PIP_DISABLE_PIP_VERSION_CHECK)
• --no-color — Suppress colored output. 😭 (the tragedy)
  • (environment variable: PIP_NO_COLOR)
• --use-feature <feature> — Enable new functionality, that may be backward incompatible. riding the bleeding edge, iconic ⚡
  • (environment variable: PIP_USE_FEATURE)
• --use-deprecated <feature> — Enable deprecated functionality, that will be removed in the future. enjoy it while it lasts, she's on her way out 🫶
  • (environment variable: PIP_USE_DEPRECATED)
• --resume-retries <resume_retries> — Maximum attempts to resume or restart an incomplete download. (default: 5)
  • (environment variable: PIP_RESUME_RETRIES)

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💜 Author 💜

pip developers — the collective, the group chat, the it-girls of packaging 🌈

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🎀 Copyright 🎀

The pip developers

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and that's the whole page, bestie!! this was pip-help(1), version 26.0, dated Aug 26, 2026 — go read some help, slay, and drink water. mwah 💋✨