- `inc`: Increment a value or version (e.g., semver). This plugin acts as both an end-user plugin as well as a simple developer example of how to create a plugin.

Nushell also ships with several plugins that serve as examples or tools for plugin developers. These include `nu_plugin_example`, `nu_plugin_custom_values`, and `nu_plugin_stress_internals`.

Core plugins are typically distributed with the Nushell release and should already be installed in the same directory as the Nushell executable. If this is the case on your system, core plugins should be using correct `nu-plugin` protocol version. If your package management system installs them separately, please make sure to update the core plugins whenever Nushell itself is updated.

::: tip Installing using Cargo
For example, when installing or upgrading Nushell directly from crates.io using `cargo install nu --locked`, the corresponding core plugins for that version may also be installed or updated using `cargo install nu_plugin_<plugin_name> --locked`.

To install all of the default (non-developer) plugins, from within Nushell run:

```nu
[ nu_plugin_inc
  nu_plugin_polars
  nu_plugin_gstat
  nu_plugin_formats
  nu_plugin_query
] | each { cargo install $in --locked } | ignore
```

:::

### Third-party Plugins

You can find third-party plugins on crates.io, online Git repositories, [`awesome-nu`](https://github.com/nushell/awesome-nu/blob/main/plugin_details.md), and other sources. As with any third-party code you run on your system, please make sure you trust its source.

To install a third-party plugin on your system, you first need to make sure the plugin uses the same version of Nu as your system:

- Confirm your Nushell version with the `version` command
- Confirm the version the plugin requires by checking its `Cargo.toml` file

To install a plugin by name from crates.io, run:

```nu
cargo install nu_plugin_<plugin_name> --locked
```

When installing from a repository (e.g., GitHub), run the following from inside the cloned repository:

```nu
cargo install --path . --locked
```

This will create a binary file that can be used to add the plugin.

::: tip Cargo installation location
By default, binaries installed with `cargo install` are placed in your home directory under `.cargo/bin`.
However, this can change depending on how your system is configured.
:::

## Registering Plugins

To add a plugin to the plugin registry file, call the [`plugin add`](/commands/docs/plugin_add.md) command to tell Nu where to find it.

::: tip Note
The plugin file name must start with `nu_plugin_`, Nu uses this filename prefix to identify plugins.
:::

- Linux and macOS:

  ```nu
  plugin add ./my_plugins/nu_plugin_cool
  ```

- Windows:

  ```nu
  plugin add .\my_plugins\nu_plugin_cool.exe
  ```

When [`plugin add`](/commands/docs/plugin_add.md) is called, Nu:

- Runs the plugin binary
- Communicates via the [plugin protocol](/contributor-book/plugin_protocol_reference.md) in order to ensure compatibility and to get a list of all of the commands it supports
- This plugin information is then saved to the plugin registry file (`$nu.plugin-path`), which acts as a cache

### Importing Plugins

Once added to the registry, the next time `nu` is started, the plugin will be imported and available in that session.

You can also immediately import (or reload) a plugin in the current session by calling `plugin use`. In this case, the name of the plugin (rather than the filename) is used without the `nu_plugin` prefix:

```nu
plugin use cool
```

It is not necessary to add `plugin use` statements to your config file. All previously registered plugins are automatically loaded at startup.

::: tip Note
`plugin use` is a parser keyword, so when evaluating a script, it will be evaluated first. This means that while you can execute `plugin add` and then `plugin use` at the REPL on separate lines, you can't do this in a single script. If you need to run `nu` with a specific plugin or set of plugins without preparing a cache file, you can pass the `--plugins` option to `nu` with a list of plugin executable files: