Skills overview

By the end of this page you will understand what a skill is, how skill matching works, and how to add your first skill.

Prerequisites

An AI Agent created (Create an AI Agent).
Admin or Developer role.

What a skill is

A skill is a named capability of your agent. Each skill has:

A name and description.
Tags and examples used to match user messages.
A system prompt (goal) applied when the skill is active.
An optional tool whitelist — the tools the agent may use for this skill.
Optional input/output types, allowed roles, and voice fillers.

Skills let you give one agent several distinct capabilities — for example, a “Document Q&A” skill and a “Data Analysis” skill — each with its own instructions and its own tools.

The Skills editor lives in the Agent Skills section of the Agent Identity tab.

Agent Skills section with the Templates, AI Generate, and Add Skill buttons

How skill matching works

When a user message arrives:

The message is matched against each skill’s tags and examples.
The best-matching skill’s tools and prompt overlay are applied.
If no skill matches with high confidence, all of the agent’s tools are available.
Skills with a disabled status are ignored during matching.

💡

Write clear, distinct descriptions and tags for each skill. Overlapping skills make matching ambiguous. Add a few realistic examples per skill to sharpen matching.

Start from a template

The Templates button opens a set of pre-configured skills you can drop in and edit. Built-in templates include Document Q&A, RAG Knowledge Base, Data Analysis, Image Analysis, and Voice Assistant. Each preloads a name, description, tags, a system prompt, input/output modes, and a starter tool whitelist.

Skill Templates panel showing the five built-in templates

Add a skill

Click Add Skill

In the Agent Skills section, click Add Skill. A new, expandable skill card appears (titled “Untitled Skill” until you name it).

Name and describe the skill

Fill in the Skill Name (a short, unique name such as “Document Q&A”) and a Description of what the skill does. Both are required to save.

Add tags

Under Tags, type keywords and press Enter or Tab to add each one. Tags drive skill matching.

Expanded skill card showing the Skill Name, Description, and Tags fields

Write the system prompt

In the System Prompt / Goal editor, describe the skill’s role and objective — for example, “You are a helpful assistant that specializes in… Your goal is to…”. You can also generate it with AI Assist (see Generate skills with AI). The prompt allows up to 16,000 characters.

Attach tools

Optionally restrict the skill to specific tools. Leave the tool list empty to let the agent use all of its tools when this skill is active. See Attach tools.

Manage skill cards

Each skill card has controls for:

Enable / Disable — the eye toggle flips a skill between active and disabled. Disabled skills are dimmed and skipped in matching.
Duplicate — copies the skill.
Delete — removes the skill.

A status badge on each card shows active (green), disabled (gray), or deprecated (orange).

Save your changes

Click Save in the header. Every skill must have a name and description, and each system prompt must be 16,000 characters or fewer, or the save is blocked.

Common issues

Save is blocked — A skill is missing its name or description, or a system prompt is too long. Fix the flagged skill.
The agent uses the wrong tools — A broad or overlapping skill is matching. Tighten descriptions/tags, or set a tool whitelist per skill.
A skill never triggers — Its status may be disabled, its tags may not match real user phrasing, or it may be restricted to roles the tester doesn’t have.