{
  "title": "Agent Skills progressive loading",
  "description": "Load skill metadata first and defer full instructions or resources until relevant. This is tracked as an independent compatibility claim.",
  "slug": "skill-progressive-loading",
  "locale": "en",
  "seoTitle": "Agent Skills progressive loading compatibility — Can My Agent Use",
  "socialTitle": "Agent Skills progressive loading",
  "socialDescription": "Load skill metadata first and defer full instructions or resources until relevant. Unreviewed product cells remain unknown.",
  "llmSummary": "Agent Skills progressive loading is atomic and does not follow automatically from broader agent-skills support.",
  "audience": "Engineers comparing agent harness capabilities.",
  "contentKind": "feature",
  "status": "published",
  "tags": [
    "runtime",
    "agent-skills"
  ],
  "updated": "2026-08-28T00:00:00.000Z",
  "published": "2026-08-28T00:00:00.000Z",
  "category": "runtime",
  "summary": "Load skill metadata first and defer full instructions or resources until relevant.",
  "specLabel": "Agent Skills specification",
  "specification": {
    "id": "agent-skills",
    "revision": "living",
    "maturity": "published convention",
    "role": "loading",
    "authority": "specification maintainers",
    "canonicalUrl": "https://agentskills.io/specification"
  },
  "aliases": [
    "progressive disclosure"
  ],
  "capabilityKind": "atomic",
  "parent": "agent-skills",
  "related": [],
  "relations": [],
  "highlight": false,
  "notes": [
    {
      "id": 1,
      "text": "Evidence checked 2026-08-28: Claude Code keeps skill descriptions available for discovery, loads the full `SKILL.md` body only on invocation, and reads supporting files on demand."
    },
    {
      "id": 2,
      "text": "Evidence checked 2026-08-28: Cursor documents on-demand loading for skill resources, keeping the main `SKILL.md` focused and loading optional resources only when needed."
    },
    {
      "id": 3,
      "text": "Evidence checked 2026-08-28: Gemini CLI documents three loading levels: metadata always present, `SKILL.md` after activation, and bundled resources only as needed."
    },
    {
      "id": 4,
      "text": "Evidence checked 2026-08-28: VS Code documents three-level loading for skill metadata, the instruction body, and referenced resources."
    }
  ],
  "issues": [],
  "resources": [
    {
      "title": "Agent Skills progressive loading reference",
      "href": "https://agentskills.io/specification",
      "kind": "spec"
    },
    {
      "id": "anthropic-claude-code-skills",
      "title": "Anthropic — Extend Claude with skills",
      "href": "https://code.claude.com/docs/en/slash-commands",
      "kind": "docs",
      "publisher": "Anthropic",
      "evidenceType": "documented",
      "reviewedAt": "2026-08-28",
      "locator": "Control who invokes a skill; add supporting files"
    },
    {
      "id": "cursor-agent-skills",
      "title": "Cursor — Agent Skills",
      "href": "https://prod.cursor.com/docs/skills",
      "kind": "docs",
      "publisher": "Cursor",
      "evidenceType": "documented",
      "reviewedAt": "2026-08-28",
      "locator": "What are skills; optional directories"
    },
    {
      "id": "gemini-agent-skills-best-practices",
      "title": "Gemini CLI — Agent Skill best practices",
      "href": "https://geminicli.com/docs/cli/skills-best-practices/",
      "kind": "docs",
      "publisher": "Google",
      "evidenceType": "documented",
      "reviewedAt": "2026-08-28",
      "locator": "Progressive disclosure"
    },
    {
      "id": "vscode-agent-skills",
      "title": "Visual Studio Code — Use Agent Skills",
      "href": "https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/agent-customization/agent-skills",
      "kind": "docs",
      "publisher": "Microsoft",
      "evidenceType": "documented",
      "reviewedAt": "2026-08-28",
      "locator": "How Copilot uses skills"
    }
  ],
  "support": [
    {
      "harness": "claude-cli",
      "versions": [
        {
          "track": "current",
          "status": "partial",
          "noteIds": [
            1
          ],
          "target": {
            "kind": "dated-documentation",
            "revision": "current Claude Code skills documentation",
            "observedAt": "2026-08-28"
          },
          "environmentProfile": "preview-enabled",
          "qualifiers": [
            {
              "type": "preview",
              "value": "the catalog's Claude Code Agent Skills core row remains qualified as beta"
            }
          ],
          "evidence": [
            {
              "resourceId": "anthropic-claude-code-skills",
              "type": "documented",
              "observedAt": "2026-08-28"
            }
          ]
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "harness": "cursor",
      "versions": [
        {
          "track": "current",
          "status": "yes",
          "noteIds": [
            2
          ],
          "target": {
            "kind": "dated-documentation",
            "revision": "current Cursor Agent Skills documentation",
            "observedAt": "2026-08-28"
          },
          "environmentProfile": "local-default",
          "qualifiers": [],
          "evidence": [
            {
              "resourceId": "cursor-agent-skills",
              "type": "documented",
              "observedAt": "2026-08-28"
            }
          ]
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "harness": "gemini-cli",
      "versions": [
        {
          "track": "current",
          "status": "yes",
          "noteIds": [
            3
          ],
          "target": {
            "kind": "dated-documentation",
            "revision": "current Gemini CLI Agent Skills documentation",
            "observedAt": "2026-08-28"
          },
          "environmentProfile": "local-default",
          "qualifiers": [],
          "evidence": [
            {
              "resourceId": "gemini-agent-skills-best-practices",
              "type": "documented",
              "observedAt": "2026-08-28"
            }
          ]
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "harness": "vscode-copilot",
      "versions": [
        {
          "track": "current",
          "status": "yes",
          "noteIds": [
            4
          ],
          "target": {
            "kind": "dated-documentation",
            "revision": "current VS Code Agent Skills documentation",
            "observedAt": "2026-08-28"
          },
          "environmentProfile": "local-default",
          "qualifiers": [],
          "evidence": [
            {
              "resourceId": "vscode-agent-skills",
              "type": "documented",
              "observedAt": "2026-08-28"
            }
          ]
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "html": "/features/skill-progressive-loading",
  "markdown": "/features/skill-progressive-loading.md",
  "json": "/api/v1/features/skill-progressive-loading.json",
  "body": "Load skill metadata first and defer full instructions or resources until relevant.\n\nSupport is recorded only when exact, dated evidence covers this behavior."
}