How to Set up Live Reload for Go Programs using Air

Summary: this tutorial will teach you how to use the air utility to set up a live reload for Go programs to boost your productivity and streamline your development workflow

Step 1. Open your terminal and create a new project directory:

mkdir airdemo

Step 2. Navigate to the project directory:

cd airdemo

Step 3. Create main.go file with the following code:

package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
	fmt.Println("Hello, World!")
}
Code language: JavaScript (javascript)

Step 4. Run the go init command:

go mod init airdemo

This will create a go.mod file that stores the Go versions and the project’s dependencies.

Step 5. Install the air utility by running this command from the terminal:

go install github.com/air-verse/air@latest

Step 6. Create the air configuration file:

air init

This command will create the .air.toml file that stores the air configuration parameters.

root = "."
testdata_dir = "testdata"
tmp_dir = "tmp"

[build]
  args_bin = []
  bin = "tmp\\main.exe"
  cmd = "go build -o ./tmp/main.exe ."
  delay = 1000
  exclude_dir = ["assets", "tmp", "vendor", "testdata"]
  exclude_file = []
  exclude_regex = ["_test.go"]
  exclude_unchanged = false
  follow_symlink = false
  full_bin = ""
  include_dir = []
  include_ext = ["go", "tpl", "tmpl", "html"]
  include_file = []
  kill_delay = "0s"
  log = "build-errors.log"
  poll = false
  poll_interval = 0
  post_cmd = []
  pre_cmd = []
  rerun = false
  rerun_delay = 500
  send_interrupt = false
  stop_on_error = false

[color]
  app = ""
  build = "yellow"
  main = "magenta"
  runner = "green"
  watcher = "cyan"

[log]
  main_only = false
  time = false

[misc]
  clean_on_exit = false

[proxy]
  app_port = 0
  enabled = false
  proxy_port = 0

[screen]
  clear_on_rebuild = false
  keep_scroll = true
Code language: JavaScript (javascript)

Step 7. Run the air command on your terminal:

air

The output will look like this:

  __    _   ___  
 / /\  | | | |_) 
/_/--\ |_| |_| \_ v1.52.3, built with Go go1.23.0

watching .
!exclude tmp
building...
running...
Hello, World!
Process Exit with Code 0Code language: PHP (php)

Step 8. Change the code in the main.go, the Air will automatically detect the change and rebuild the program:

package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
	fmt.Println("Hi there!")
}
Code language: JavaScript (javascript)

Air will produce the following output:

main.go has changed
building...
running...
Hi there!
Process Exit with Code 0Code language: JavaScript (javascript)