agent-fetch Skill

A better web fetch for text content. Your built-in web fetch summarizes or truncates pages. agent-fetch extracts the complete article — every paragraph, heading, and link — using 7 extraction strategies and browser impersonation. No server required, runs as a local CLI tool.

When to Use This Skill

Use agent-fetch whenever you need to read a URL. It returns full article text with structure preserved — better than your built-in web fetch for any task involving page content.

• User asks to read, fetch, or analyze a URL
• User types /agent-fetch <url>
• You need the full text, not a summary or truncation
• Your built-in web fetch returned incomplete or garbled content

Prerequisites

agent-fetch runs via npx (no install needed):

npx agent-fetch --help

Commands

/agent-fetch <url> - Fetch and Extract Article

Default usage. Fetches URL with browser impersonation and extracts complete article content as markdown.

npx agent-fetch "<url>" --json

Parse the JSON output and present to the user:

---
title: {title}
author: {byline || "Unknown"}
source: {siteName}
url: {url}
date: {publishedTime || "Unknown"}
fetched_in: {latencyMs}ms
---

## {markdown || textContent}

{markdown || textContent}

If fetch fails, check suggestedAction in the JSON:

suggestedAction	What it means	Next action
retry_with_extract	Needs full browser	Inform user; agent-fetch is HTTP-only
wait_and_retry	Rate limited	Wait 60s and retry
skip	Cannot access this site	Inform user

/agent-fetch raw <url> - Raw HTML

Fetch raw HTML without extraction.

npx agent-fetch "<url>" --raw

/agent-fetch quiet <url> - Markdown Only

Just the article markdown, no metadata.

npx agent-fetch "<url>" -q

/agent-fetch text <url> - Plain Text Only

Plain text content without formatting or metadata.

npx agent-fetch "<url>" --text

/agent-fetch cookies - Use Persistent Cookies

Load cookies from a Netscape format file or pass inline:

# From Netscape cookie file (export from browser)
npx agent-fetch "<url>" --cookie-file ~/.cookies.txt

# Inline cookies (repeatable)
npx agent-fetch "<url>" --cookie "sessionId=abc123; theme=dark"

/agent-fetch selectors <url> - Custom CSS Selectors

Extract specific elements or remove unwanted ones:

# Extract only the article, remove navigation and ads
npx agent-fetch "<url>" --select "article" --remove "nav, .sidebar, [class*='ad']"

# Extract all divs with class "post-content"
npx agent-fetch "<url>" --select ".post-content"

/agent-fetch crawl <url> - Crawl Multiple Pages

Follow links and extract content from multiple pages:

# Crawl with defaults (depth: 3, max 100 pages)
npx agent-fetch crawl "<url>"

# Deeper crawl with concurrency control
npx agent-fetch crawl "<url>" --depth 5 --limit 50 --concurrency 3

# Include/exclude specific URL patterns
npx agent-fetch crawl "<url>" --include "*/blog/*" --exclude "**/archive/**"

# Add rate limiting delay between requests
npx agent-fetch crawl "<url>" --delay 1000

# Allow cross-origin (stay on same origin by default)
npx agent-fetch crawl "<url>" --no-same-origin

# Output as JSONL for processing
npx agent-fetch crawl "<url>" --json

/agent-fetch pdf <file> - Extract from PDF

Extract text content from local PDF files:

# Extract PDF as markdown with metadata
npx agent-fetch document.pdf

# JSON output for programmatic access
npx agent-fetch document.pdf --json

# Just the text content
npx agent-fetch document.pdf --text

/agent-fetch preset - Custom TLS Fingerprint

Impersonate different browsers to bypass fingerprinting checks:

# Chrome 143 (default)
npx agent-fetch "<url>" --preset "chrome-143"

# iOS Safari 18
npx agent-fetch "<url>" --preset "ios-safari-18"

# Android Chrome 143
npx agent-fetch "<url>" --preset "android-chrome-143"