# Installation
FlexRAG is a Python package that can be installed via `pip` or from source.

```{important}
FlexRAG requires Python 3.11 or later.
```

## Installation via `pip`
Before installing FlexRAG, ensure that `faiss` is installed in your environment. You can install it using the following command:

```bash
pip install faiss-cpu
```

```{note}
The pypi package is provided by the community.
If you want to use the official `faiss` package or employ GPU for faster searching, you need to install it using `conda` and follow the instructions from its official [documentation](https://github.com/facebookresearch/faiss/blob/main/INSTALL.md).
```

After installing `faiss`, run the following command to install FlexRAG:

```bash
pip install flexrag
```

## Installation from source
Alternatively, to install FlexRAG from the source, follow the steps below:
```bash
pip install pybind11 faiss-cpu

git clone https://github.com/ictnlp/FlexRAG.git
cd flexrag
pip install ./
```

```{tip}
You can also install the FlexRAG in *editable* mode with the `-e` flag.
This allows you to make changes to the source code and have them reflected immediately without needing to reinstall the package.
```