Suggest edit — creating-skills

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# creating skills

## the standard

related: [[official|official]] · [[tooling|tooling]] · [[frameworks|frameworks]] · [[resources|resources]]

skills follow the [Agent Skills specification](https://agentskills.io/specification) — adopted by Claude Code, Codex CLI, Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot, and VS Code. a skill is a directory with a `SKILL.md` file.

## structure

```
my-skill/
├── SKILL.md          # required: YAML frontmatter + instructions
├── scripts/          # optional: helper scripts
├── templates/        # optional: document templates
└── resources/        # optional: reference files
```

## template

```markdown
---
name: my-skill-name
description: a clear description of what this skill does and when to use it.
---

# my skill name

detailed description.

## when to use this skill

- use case 1
- use case 2

## instructions

[instructions for Claude]

## examples

[real examples]
```

the `description` field is critical — it's what determines auto-triggering. Anthropic's `skill-creator` skill has a dedicated script to optimize trigger descriptions.

## installation

### Claude Code
```bash
# personal skills
mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills/
cp -r my-skill ~/.claude/skills/

# project skills
cp -r my-skill .claude/skills/
```

### Claude.ai
click the skill icon (puzzle piece) in the chat interface.

### API
```python
import anthropic
client = anthropic.Anthropic(api_key="your-api-key")
response = client.messages.create(
    model="claude-sonnet-4-20250514",
    skills=["skill-id-here"],
    messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "your prompt"}]
)
```

## tools for building skills

- **[skill-creator](https://github.com/anthropics/skills/tree/main/skills/skill-creator)** — Anthropic's official meta-skill. interactive Q&A, eval framework, description optimizer. see [[official]].
- **[Skill Seekers](https://github.com/yusufkaraaslan/Skill_Seekers)** — auto-converts documentation websites into skills.
- **[claude-code-skill-factory](https://github.com/alirezarezvani/claude-code-skill-factory)** (685 stars) — production-ready skill toolkit.

## the key insight from the manifesto

> some agents/tools combinations are good where only the description of the skill is loaded and when the model uses it, then the entire thing gets loaded. other times its not as good and all the instructions on how to use every tool are dumped into the initial prompt. — [vibe coding manifesto](https://www.moonflowers.xyz/writing/vibe_coding_manifesto)

write short, precise descriptions. keep instructions focused. a skill that adds 2000 tokens of context to every conversation but only triggers 5% of the time is a net negative.