Environment Variables¶

All Knowmarks configuration can be set via environment variables. No config files are required.

Core¶

Variable	Default	Description
`KNOWMARKS_DATA_DIR`	OS default	Data directory path. Contains the database, model cache, and config file.
`KNOWMARKS_HOST`	`127.0.0.1`	Server bind address. Set to `0.0.0.0` to allow external access.
`KNOWMARKS_PORT`	`3749`	Server port for the dashboard and REST API.
`KNOWMARKS_API_KEY`	(empty)	Bearer token for REST API authentication. When set, all `/api/v1/` requests require `Authorization: Bearer <key>`.

Embedding¶

Variable	Default	Description
`KNOWMARKS_EMBEDDING_PROVIDER`	`fastembed`	Embedding provider: `fastembed`, `ollama`, or `openai`.
`KNOWMARKS_EMBEDDING_MODEL`	`BAAI/bge-small-en-v1.5`	Embedding model name. Must match the provider's model format.
`KNOWMARKS_EMBEDDING_ENDPOINT`	(empty)	Endpoint URL for Ollama or OpenAI-compatible providers.
`KNOWMARKS_EMBEDDING_API_KEY`	(empty)	API key for OpenAI-compatible embedding providers.

Model locking

The embedding model is locked on first use. All items in a collection must use the same model for consistent search results. Changing the model requires re-embedding all items.

LLM¶

Variable	Default	Description
`KM_LLM_URL`	`https://openrouter.ai/api/v1`	OpenAI-compatible LLM endpoint URL.
`KM_LLM_MODEL`	`google/gemini-2.5-flash`	LLM model name.
`KM_LLM_API_KEY`	(empty)	API key for the LLM provider. Required for OpenRouter and other hosted providers.
`KM_LLM_ENABLED`	`1`	Set to `0` to disable all LLM features (chat, summaries, query expansion).

Telemetry¶

Variable	Default	Description
`KM_SENTRY_DSN`	(empty)	Sentry DSN for error reporting. Leave empty to disable.
`KM_POSTHOG_KEY`	(empty)	PostHog project key for usage analytics. Leave empty to disable.
`KM_POSTHOG_HOST`	`https://us.i.posthog.com`	PostHog API host.

Other¶

Variable	Default	Description
`KM_GITHUB_TOKEN`	(empty)	GitHub token for feedback submission.
`KM_FEEDBACK_REPO`	(empty)	GitHub repository for feedback issues.
`KM_LOG_LEVEL`	`INFO`	Logging level: `DEBUG`, `INFO`, `WARNING`, `ERROR`.

Docker-Specific¶

When running in Docker, set variables via -e flags or in docker-compose.yml:

docker run -v knowmarks_data:/data -p 3749:3749 \
  -e KNOWMARKS_HOST=0.0.0.0 \
  -e KNOWMARKS_EMBEDDING_PROVIDER=ollama \
  -e KNOWMARKS_EMBEDDING_ENDPOINT=http://host.docker.internal:11434 \
  knowmarks:slim