# Cold start cursor cli headless mode slow

**URL:** <https://forum.cursor.com/t/cold-start-cursor-cli-headless-mode-slow/150430>\
**Category:** Help\
**Tags:** cli, performance\
**Created:** [January 30, 2026, 11:55pm UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/cold-start-cursor-cli-headless-mode-slow/150430 "2026-01-30T23:55:58Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![cyril.xie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@cyril.xie](https://forum.cursor.com/u/cyril.xie)\
**Post date:** [January 30, 2026, 11:55pm UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/cold-start-cursor-cli-headless-mode-slow/150430/1 "2026-01-30T23:55:58Z")

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I’m using Cursor Agent P in headless mode to build a web-based multi-turn conversation feature.

Currently, each turn starts a new Cursor process, which causes a cold start delay of about 20 seconds.

This results in a poor user experience because users have to wait for every turn.

Is there a more efficient approach to keep the process warm or avoid restarting it for each

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**Author:** ![Chris\_Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/da6949/32.png) [@Chris\_Drake](https://forum.cursor.com/u/Chris_Drake)\
**Post date:** [January 31, 2026, 2:31am UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/cold-start-cursor-cli-headless-mode-slow/150430/3 "2026-01-31T02:31:39Z")

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have you experimented with --resume ?  
the agent is a node js application - you can ask cursor to modify it if you want to get your hands dirty, so you could then hook into the IO of an agent process that stays running…

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**Author:** ![Chris\_Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/da6949/32.png) [@Chris\_Drake](https://forum.cursor.com/u/Chris_Drake)\
**Post date:** [January 31, 2026, 2:33am UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/cold-start-cursor-cli-headless-mode-slow/150430/4 "2026-01-31T02:33:31Z")

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another idea - I think there’s 2 or 3 hooks that the agent kindof half obeys - maybe you could write a hook that deliberately blocks until the user starts talking?

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**Author:** ![condor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/cursor1/user_avatar/forum.cursor.com/condor/32/73148_2.png) [@condor](https://forum.cursor.com/u/condor)\
**Post date:** [January 31, 2026, 10:31am UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/cold-start-cursor-cli-headless-mode-slow/150430/5 "2026-01-31T10:31:35Z")

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This may likely be match for #Ideas > Feature Requests instead of help.

Also curious @cyril.xie why it would take 20 sec for agent to start? For me its instant.

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**Author:** ![Michael\_Kufner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c89c15/32.png) [@Michael\_Kufner](https://forum.cursor.com/u/Michael_Kufner)\
**Post date:** [March 5, 2026, 9:29pm UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/cold-start-cursor-cli-headless-mode-slow/150430/6 "2026-03-05T21:29:04Z")

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–resume doesnt work on headless mode ☹