The HQ Asset Library

3 min read Updated Oct 2026

Anyone who knows the photo, the deck, or the demo video exists somewhere, and just wants it back.

Every team has the same problem. Somewhere there's a photo of the crew at the booth, the product shot the agency sent, or the demo video from three months ago. Someone has it. Nobody can find it.

The HQ Asset Library fixes the finding part. Put your images and video in, then ask for them by what's in them, not by filename. It's the media side of finding anything in HQ.

Add a file, and HQ labels it for you#

Drop something in with one command:

shell

hq library add summit-recap.mp4

When you add a file, HQ writes a short description and suggests tags on its own, so it's findable later even if nobody got around to labeling it. A 2 GB video is fine; so is a single screenshot. Pass several files at once, or an http(s) link, and HQ brings them all in.

A few options worth knowing:

--title and --note set the name and description yourself instead of letting HQ guess.
--tags tag1,tag2 adds your own tags on the way in.
--no-caption skips the AI description and tags entirely, for anything sensitive you'd rather label by hand.

Find it by describing it#

Ask for what you remember about the file, not its name:

shell

hq library search "the booth video from the summit"

Search reads the descriptions and tags HQ generated, so "the deck we showed the agency" finds the deck even if the file is called final_v3_REAL.key. It runs on the HQ CLI and through MCP, so your bots can dig through the library too.

Already know roughly where it is? hq library ls lists what's in a library folder.

The files don't fill up anyone's laptop#

The original lives in your company vault. Every other computer keeps a placeholder about 1 KB in size instead of the whole file.

That means your whole team can search all of it without downloading any of it. You pull the real file with hq library fetch only when you actually need it, to edit or attach something. A library of hundreds of gigabytes costs each teammate a few kilobytes.

Hand one file to someone#

When you need to give a single file to a person:

shell

hq library link booth-video.mp4

You get a download link that lasts 15 minutes (set your own window with --expires, up to 60). It isn't a new share and it doesn't open up anything else in your vault, just that one file, just for a moment.

For bots and agents#

The same library is available to your HQ bots through MCP tools, and to headless agents through an API key. A bot can search the library, pull a file, and hand it off in a workflow, the same way a person would.

Getting started#

You'll want HQ CLI 5.345.155 or newer. Add a file you know you'll look for later, then try finding it by describing it. Once a few things are in, the library is the fastest way to answer "where's that file?" for your whole team.

Common questions#

Does everyone see everything I add?

It follows your company's access, the same as the rest of your vault. People outside the company never see it.

What if the auto-description is wrong?

Re-run it with hq library describe, adjust tags with hq library tag, or set your own note at add time with --note. For something sensitive, add it with --no-caption and write the note yourself from the start.

Can I add several files at once?

Yes. Pass multiple files (or http(s) links) to hq library add and HQ brings them all in, describing each as it goes.

Where do the files actually live?

The originals are in your company vault; every machine keeps tiny placeholders in companies/<company>/library/. See HQ Cloud explained for how the vault works.

If you get stuck#

If hq library isn't found, update the HQ CLI (you'll want 5.345.155 or newer). If a search comes back empty for something you just added, give it a moment to index and try describing it a different way. Persistent trouble: /hq-bug.