Adding agent skills for GitHub Copilot

Agent skills are folders of instructions, scripts, and resources that Copilot can load when relevant to improve its performance in specialized tasks. For more information, see About agent skills.

Creating and adding a skill

To create an agent skill, you write a SKILL.md file and, optionally, other resources, such as supplementary Markdown files, or scripts, which you reference in the SKILL.md instructions.

1. If you haven't already done so, create a skills directory in one of the following locations. This is where you will locate your skill, and any others you may want to create in the future.

   For project skills, specific to a single repository, create a .github/skills, .claude/skills, or .agents/skills directory in your repository.

   For personal skills, shared across projects, create a ~/.copilot/skills, ~/.claude/skills, or ~/.agents/skills directory in your local home directory.

2. Within the skills directory, create a subdirectory for your new skill. Each skill should have its own directory (for example, .github/skills/webapp-testing).

   Skill subdirectory names should be lowercase and use hyphens for spaces.

3. In your skill subdirectory, create a SKILL.md file containing your skill's instructions.

   Important

   Skill files must be named SKILL.md.

   SKILL.md files are Markdown files with YAML frontmatter. In their simplest form, they include:

   • YAML frontmatter
     • name (required): A unique identifier for the skill. This must be lowercase, using hyphens for spaces. Typically, this matches the name of the skill's directory.
     • description (required): A description of what the skill does, and when Copilot should use it.
     • license (optional): A description of the license that applies to this skill.
   • A Markdown body, with the instructions, examples and guidelines for Copilot to follow.

4. Optionally, add scripts, examples or other resources to your skill's directory.

   For more information, see "Enabling a skill to run a script."

Example SKILL.md file

For a project skill, this file would be located in a .github/skills/github-actions-failure-debugging directory of your repository.

For a personal skill, this file would be located in a ~/.copilot/skills/github-actions-failure-debugging directory.

---
name: github-actions-failure-debugging
description: Guide for debugging failing GitHub Actions workflows. Use this when asked to debug failing GitHub Actions workflows.
---

To debug failing GitHub Actions workflows in a pull request, follow this process, using tools provided from the GitHub MCP Server:

1. Use the `list_workflow_runs` tool to look up recent workflow runs for the pull request and their status
2. Use the `summarize_job_log_failures` tool to get an AI summary of the logs for failed jobs, to understand what went wrong without filling your context windows with thousands of lines of logs
3. If you still need more information, use the `get_job_logs` or `get_workflow_run_logs` tool to get the full, detailed failure logs
4. Try to reproduce the failure yourself in your own environment.
5. Fix the failing build. If you were able to reproduce the failure yourself, make sure it is fixed before committing your changes.

---
name: github-actions-failure-debugging
description: Guide for debugging failing GitHub Actions workflows. Use this when asked to debug failing GitHub Actions workflows.
---

To debug failing GitHub Actions workflows in a pull request, follow this process, using tools provided from the GitHub MCP Server:

1. Use the `list_workflow_runs` tool to look up recent workflow runs for the pull request and their status
2. Use the `summarize_job_log_failures` tool to get an AI summary of the logs for failed jobs, to understand what went wrong without filling your context windows with thousands of lines of logs
3. If you still need more information, use the `get_job_logs` or `get_workflow_run_logs` tool to get the full, detailed failure logs
4. Try to reproduce the failure yourself in your own environment.
5. Fix the failing build. If you were able to reproduce the failure yourself, make sure it is fixed before committing your changes.

Enabling a skill to run a script

When a skill is invoked, Copilot automatically discovers all of the files in the skill's directory and makes them available alongside the skill's instructions. This means you can include scripts or other resources in the skill directory and reference them in your SKILL.md instructions.

To create a skill that runs a script:

1. Add the script to your skill's directory. For example, a skill for converting SVG images to PNG might have the following structure.

   .github/skills/image-convert/
   ├── SKILL.md
   └── convert-svg-to-png.sh
   

2. Optionally pre-approve the tools the skill needs. In your SKILL.md frontmatter, you can use the allowed-tools field to list the tools Copilot may use without asking for confirmation each time. If a tool is not listed in the allowed-tools field, Copilot will prompt you for permission before using it.

   ---
   name: image-convert
   description: Converts SVG images to PNG format. Use when asked to convert SVG files.
   allowed-tools: shell
   ---
   

   Warning

   Only pre-approve the shell or bash tools if you have reviewed this skill and any referenced scripts, and you fully trust their source. Pre-approving shell or bash removes the confirmation step for running terminal commands and can allow attacker-controlled skills or prompt injections to execute arbitrary commands in your environment. When in doubt, omit shell and bash from allowed-tools so that Copilot must ask for your explicit confirmation before running terminal commands.

3. Write instructions that tell Copilot how to use the script. In the Markdown body of SKILL.md, describe when and how to run the script.

   When asked to convert an SVG to PNG, run the `convert-svg-to-png.sh` script
   from this skill's base directory, passing the input SVG file path as the
   first argument.
   

Adding a skill that someone else has created

In addition to creating your own skills, you can also add skills that other people have created.

1. Download a skill directory (that is, a directory containing a SKILL.md file and, optionally, other files and subdirectories).

   For example, download a skill from the Awesome GitHub Copilot repository: https://awesome-copilot.github.com/skills/.

2. If you downloaded a .zip file, unzip this.

3. Move the skill directory to the required location:

   • For project skills, specific to a single repository: .github/skills, .claude/skills, or .agents/skills in your repository.

   • For personal skills, shared across projects: ~/.copilot/skills, ~/.claude/skills, or ~/.agents/skills in your local home directory.

Managing skills with GitHub CLI

You can use the gh skill command in GitHub CLI to discover, install, update, and publish agent skills from GitHub repositories.

For the full list of gh skill subcommands, run gh skill --help or see the gh skill section of the GitHub CLI manual.

Installing skills

You can search for skills, preview them, and install them from GitHub repositories.

1. Search for skills by topic:

   gh skill search TOPIC
   

2. Preview a skill to inspect its contents before installing. This renders the skill's SKILL.md and file tree in your terminal without installing anything:

   gh skill preview OWNER/REPOSITORY SKILL
   

3. Install a skill. You can run gh skill install with no arguments for a fully interactive flow, or specify a repository to browse its skills interactively:

   gh skill install OWNER/REPOSITORY
   

   To install a specific skill directly:

   gh skill install OWNER/REPOSITORY SKILL
   

   For example, to install a skill from the github/awesome-copilot repository:

   Shell

   gh skill install github/awesome-copilot documentation-writer
   

   You can install a specific version using @TAG or @SHA:

   Shell

   gh skill install github/awesome-copilot documentation-writer@v1.2.0
   

   To lock a skill to a specific version (or commit SHA) so it is skipped during updates, use --pin:

   Shell

   gh skill install github/awesome-copilot documentation-writer --pin v1.2.0
   

   Note

   The @VERSION syntax and --pin flag are mutually exclusive. Use one or the other, not both.

   To install a skill for a specific agent host, use the --agent flag. To control the install scope, use --scope:

   Shell

   gh skill install github/awesome-copilot documentation-writer --agent claude-code --scope user
   

Skills are automatically installed to the correct directory for your agent host. By default, skills are installed for Copilot at project scope.

Updating skills

When you install a skill with gh skill, provenance metadata is written into the skill's SKILL.md frontmatter, including the source repository, ref, and tree SHA. The gh skill update command uses this metadata to check for upstream changes.

To check for updates interactively:

gh skill update

To update a specific skill:

gh skill update SKILL

To update all installed skills without prompting:

gh skill update --all

Pinned skills are skipped during updates. To update a pinned skill, reinstall it with a new --pin value.

Publishing skills

If you maintain a skills repository, you can validate and publish your skills using GitHub CLI.

To validate your skills against the Agent Skills specification and check remote settings like tag protection, secret scanning, and code scanning, without publishing, use --dry-run:

gh skill publish --dry-run

To auto-fix metadata issues in your skill files, use --fix. This does not publish your skills:

gh skill publish --fix

To validate and publish your skills:

gh skill publish

How Copilot uses agent skills

When performing tasks, Copilot will decide when to use your skills based on your prompt and the skill's description.

When Copilot chooses to use a skill, the SKILL.md file will be injected in the agent's context, giving the agent access to your instructions. It can then follow those instructions and use any scripts or examples you may have included in the skill's directory.

Skills versus custom instructions

You can use both skills and custom instructions to teach Copilot how to work in your repository and how to perform specific tasks.

We recommend using custom instructions for simple instructions relevant to almost every task (for example information about your repository's coding standards), and skills for more detailed instructions that Copilot should only access when relevant.

To learn more about repository custom instructions, see Adding repository custom instructions for GitHub Copilot.