What are Skills?

Skills are the fundamental building blocks of AI agent capabilities. They define what an AI assistant can do and how it should do it. A skill essentially teaches an AI how to perform a specific task or set of tasks.

Skill Components

Frontmatter

YAML metadata that defines the skill's identity and triggers:

---
name: pdf-reader
description: Extract text from PDF files
triggers:
  - when user mentions PDF
  - when user uploads a .pdf file
---

Instructions (Prompt Engineering)

Measurements, guidelines, and step-by-step instructions in Markdown that the AI uses to execute the skill. This is the "brain" of your skill.

Tools (MCP)

Skills can optionally expose executable tools via the Model Context Protocol (MCP), allowing the AI to interact with external systems.