Supported Agents

Agent Tools Loadout supports three AI coding agents. Each has its own file format, directory structure, and frontmatter conventions.

---

Overview

Feature	Cursor	GitHub Copilot	Claude
Instructions	:white_check_mark:	:white_check_mark:	:white_check_mark:
Skills	:white_check_mark:	:white_check_mark:	:white_check_mark:
Sub-agents	—	:white_check_mark:	:white_check_mark:
Rules directory	.cursor/rules/	.github/instructions/	.claude/rules/
File extension	.mdc	.instructions.md	.md
Main config file	.cursorrules	.github/copilot-instructions.md	CLAUDE.md

---

Cursor

File locations

Content Type	Directory	Extension
Instructions	.cursor/rules/	.mdc
Skills	.cursor/rules/	.mdc

Frontmatter format

---
description: "Instructions: Clean Code Standards — Write clean, maintainable code"
alwaysApply: false
---

• description follows the pattern: "<Type>: <name> — <description>"
• alwaysApply defaults to false

Limitations

Cursor does not support sub-agent content type. If you try to equip a sub-agent to Cursor, the operation will be skipped with a warning.

---

GitHub Copilot

File locations

Content Type	Directory	Extension
Instructions	.github/instructions/	.instructions.md
Skills	.github/prompts/	.prompt.md
Sub-agents	.github/agents/	.agent.md

Frontmatter format

Instructions:

---
applyTo: "**"
---

Skills (.prompt.md) and Sub-agents (.agent.md) use the same applyTo frontmatter.

Notes

• Copilot supports all three content types
• Skills are placed in .github/prompts/ with the .prompt.md extension
• Sub-agents are placed in .github/agents/ with the .agent.md extension
• The applyTo field uses glob patterns; "**" means the instruction applies to all files

---

Claude

File locations

Content Type	Directory	Extension
Instructions	.claude/rules/	.md
Skills	.claude/commands/	.md
Sub-agents	.claude/agents/	.md

Frontmatter format

Instructions:

---
description: "Clean Code Standards: Write clean, maintainable code"
---

Skills:

---
description: "Write clean, maintainable code"
---

Sub-agents:

---
description: "Clean Code Standards"
---

Notes

• Claude supports all three content types
• Instructions use "<name>: <description>" format for the description
• Skills use just the description (or name if no description)
• Sub-agents use just the name
• All files use the standard .md extension

---

File Naming

When equipping content, file names are generated from the content name:

1. Convert to lowercase
2. Replace non-alphanumeric characters with hyphens
3. Strip leading/trailing hyphens
4. Add content type prefix for skills and sub-agents
5. Add agent-specific extension

Content type prefixes

Content Type	Prefix
Instructions	(none)
Skills	skill-
Sub-agents	subagent-

Examples

Content Name	Agent	Output File
Clean Code Standards	Cursor	.cursor/rules/clean-code-standards.mdc
Clean Code Standards	Copilot	.github/instructions/clean-code-standards.instructions.md
Clean Code Standards	Claude	.claude/rules/clean-code-standards.md
PR Security Review	Copilot	.github/prompts/skill-pr-security-review.prompt.md
Code Review Expert	Claude	.claude/agents/subagent-code-review-expert.md

---

Convert Between Formats

Use the Convert command to transform an existing agent configuration file:

Command Palette → Agent Tools Loadout: Convert

1. Select the source agent (format you're converting from)
2. Select the target agent (format you want)
3. The source file is read and normalized
4. A new file is written in the target format

Both files remain in your workspace — the original is not deleted.

Conversion matrix

From \ To	Cursor	Copilot	Claude
Cursor	—	:white_check_mark:	:white_check_mark:
Copilot	:white_check_mark:	—	:white_check_mark:
Claude	:white_check_mark:	:white_check_mark:	—