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What Are Agent Skills?

Agent Skills are portable folders with SKILL.md that teach AI agents specialized workflows. Learn the format, how discovery works, and where to install them.

Updated 2026-06-22

Agent Skills are portable folders that extend AI agents with specialized knowledge and workflows. Each skill contains a SKILL.md file with YAML frontmatter (name, description) and markdown instructions.

How discovery works

Agents use **progressive disclosure**: at startup they load only skill names and descriptions. When a task matches, they read the full SKILL.md. Optional scripts/, references/, and assets/ directories provide on-demand resources.

Directory structure

my-skill/
├── SKILL.md          # Required
├── scripts/          # Optional executable code
├── references/       # Optional documentation
└── assets/           # Optional templates and data

Supported platforms

Cursor, Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Windsurf, Codex CLI, and any agentskills.io-compatible agent.

FAQ

What is an Agent Skill?

An Agent Skill is a directory containing a SKILL.md file with YAML frontmatter (name, description) and markdown instructions. Agents load skill metadata at startup and read full instructions when a task matches the description.

Who created the Agent Skills format?

The format was originally developed by Anthropic and released as an open standard at agentskills.io. It is now supported by Cursor, Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Windsurf, Codex CLI, and many other agents.