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A skill is a playbook. It teaches an agent how to do a specific kind of work: the steps to follow, the terms to know, and the way you want it done. Turn a skill on for a teammate and it knows how to do that job whenever it comes up. Skills are reusable. Write one once, or add one from the catalog, and any of your agents can use it. They keep your teammates consistent, so the same task gets done the same way every time, no matter which agent picks it up. This page covers your Skills library, how to add skills, and how to turn them on for the agents that need them. To shape a single agent end to end, see Customizing an agent.

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Where your skills live

Open the Skills area to see everything your workspace has. It is a two-panel view: a list of your skills on the left, and the details of the one you have selected on the right. Your skills are grouped by where they came from:
  • Reload bundled. Ready-made skills that ship with Reload. These are read only, so you can use them but not change them.
  • Workspace. Skills authored or brought in by your team. These are yours to edit.
Filter the list from the search box at the top to find a skill by name. Select any skill to open its details.

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What a skill is

Select a skill to see what it does and how it behaves:
  • Description. A short line that tells an agent when to reach for this skill.
  • Its instructions. The full playbook, written in plain Markdown. Toggle between the readable View and the raw Code to see exactly what an agent follows.
  • Trust. Most skills are marked Safe, meaning they are instructions only. A skill marked Includes scripts bundles runnable steps, so you can see that up front and decide with your eyes open.
  • Used by. The agents that currently have this skill turned on.
Skills hold instructions, never secrets. Passwords and keys live with your connected tools, which stay locked away from the skill’s text.
An agent does not carry every skill’s full instructions in every conversation. It sees the short description of each skill it has, and pulls in the full playbook only when the work in front of it matches. So you can give a teammate plenty of skills without slowing it down or cluttering its replies.

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Add a skill

From the Skills area, open the Add skill menu. You have two ways to bring in a new one: add a ready-made skill from the catalog, or write your own.

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Add from the catalog

Reload comes with a catalog of popular, ready-made public skills you can add in one click. They cover work like reading and editing documents, spreadsheets, and slide decks, plus design and writing guidance, and more.
1

Open the catalog

In the Add skill menu, choose Browse catalog.
2

Pick a skill

Search the popular skills, then choose Import on the one you want. You can also paste a link to any public skill if it is not in the list.
3

Choose who gets it (optional)

Set who the skill is for: nobody yet, all of your agents, or a few you pick. You can change this later, and nothing turns on until you review the skill.
4

Review before it runs

An imported skill arrives as Pending. Open it, read the instructions, and choose Activate skill to make it live. Until you do, it never runs, even for agents you assigned it to.
A skill you import brings in instructions written outside your workspace. Read them before you activate it, the same way you would read anything before letting a teammate follow it. Reload holds every imported skill as Pending until you approve it, on purpose.

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Write your own

To capture the way your team does something, write your own skill.
1

Start a new skill

In the Add skill menu, choose Create skill, then Write skill instructions.
2

Name it and describe it

Give it a short name and a one-line description. The description is how an agent knows when to use it, so make it clear, like “Use when turning a meeting transcript into action items.”
3

Write the playbook

In the instructions box, write what the agent should do, when, and any terms it needs, using plain Markdown.
4

Create it

Choose Create skill. It lands in your Workspace group, ready to turn on for your agents.
Want more control while you write? The Add skill menu also has an advanced editor. It lets you save a skill as a draft while you shape it, or submit it for someone to approve, before it goes live. A draft stays off until you activate it.

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Turn skills on for your agents

Adding a skill to your library does not switch it on. You choose which agents get which skills, and a skill is never on for the whole workspace at once. That way each teammate carries only the playbooks that fit its job.

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From a skill

On a skill’s detail panel, use the Enabled for card:
  • All my agents. Turn the skill on for every agent you own, including ones you add later. This is available for skills you own. Turn an individual agent off below to leave it out.
  • Specific agents. Pick agent by agent who gets the skill.

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From the enablement matrix

For a bird’s-eye view across your whole team, open Enablement matrix from the Skills header. It is a grid of your skills down the side and your agents across the top. Flip any cell to turn a skill on or off for that agent. Your own agents are yours to change; a teammate’s agents show as read only. The matrix also has a Conflicts view. If two skills share the same name, an agent could be unsure which one to follow. Conflicts flags those so you can open each and remove the copy you do not want.

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From an agent’s chat

While chatting with an agent, use the Skills control at the top of the conversation. It shows how many skills that agent has and opens a panel where you can add one from the catalog or turn one off, right where you are working.

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From the agent builder

When you build or edit an agent, the Skills section lists every skill it has enabled. Toggle them on and off there alongside the rest of its setup. See Customizing an agent.

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Skills and agents that run outside Reload

Your agents can suggest bringing in a skill they think would help. When one does, the skill still arrives as Pending and waits for a person to review and turn it on. You stay in control of what your team can do. Connected agents that run outside Reload manage their own abilities, so you assign them work in channels rather than skills. See Connected agents.

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Questions

A skill is know-how: the playbook for doing a kind of work. A tool is access: an outside app an agent can act in, like your calendar or your inbox. A skill can tell an agent how to run a report; a tool is what lets it reach the data. Many skills need no tools at all. See Connect your tools.
Reload bundled skills are read only. To make your own version, write a new skill in your Workspace group and edit it freely.
A skill you imported, or one saved as a draft, is not live yet. Open it, read the instructions, and choose Activate. Until you do, it never runs, even for agents it is assigned to. This keeps instructions from outside your workspace from running before you have looked at them.
No. Skills are instructions only. The access an agent needs lives with your connected tools, kept separate from any skill’s text.
No. An agent only pulls in a skill’s full instructions when the work matches. The rest of the time it just knows the skill is there. Give a teammate as many as fit its job.

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Keep going

Customize an agent

Shape a teammate’s role, skills, tools, and guardrails in one place.

Connect your tools

Give your agents access to the apps your team already uses.

Work with agents

Chat with a teammate and watch its work as it happens.

Hire your team

Bring on ready-made agents that come with skills built in.