Bruno

Overview

Bruno is an open-source, offline-first API client designed as a privacy-respecting alternative to Postman. It stores collections directly on the filesystem using a plain text markup language called Bru, making them fully version-controllable with Git. Bruno does not sync data to the cloud by default, giving teams full control over their API collections and secrets.

Use Cases

• •Testing and debugging REST, GraphQL, and gRPC APIs locally without cloud sync
• •Storing API collections in Git repositories alongside application code
• •Sharing API collections with teams through standard version control workflows
• •Running API tests in CI/CD pipelines using the Bruno CLI
• •Replacing Postman for teams concerned about data privacy and cloud storage
• •Collaborating on API testing without requiring a paid subscription

Features

• •Offline-first with no mandatory cloud sync
• •Git-friendly Bru plain text collection format
• •REST, GraphQL, and gRPC support
• •Environment variable management
• •Pre-request and post-request scripting
• •CLI runner for CI/CD integration
• •Postman and Insomnia collection import

Integrations

Getting Started

1. 1Download Bruno from usebruno.com for your operating system
2. 2Create a new collection and save it to a directory inside your project repository
3. 3Add API requests to the collection and configure environment variables
4. 4Commit the collection files to Git alongside your application code
5. 5Use the Bruno CLI to run collections in CI/CD pipelines

Practical Notes

• •Collections are stored as plain text .bru files, making Git diffs and reviews straightforward
• •No account or internet connection is required to use Bruno
• •Postman collections can be imported to ease migration
• •The CLI (bru run) is available via npm and supports scripting and assertions

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