agent-teams

Agent Teams

Experimental: Agent teams require CLAUDE_CODE_EXPERIMENTAL_AGENT_TEAMS=1 and may change between Claude Code versions.

BREAKING (Claude Code 2.1.178): The explicit TeamCreate / TeamDelete tools were removed. Every session now has one implicit team when CLAUDE_CODE_EXPERIMENTAL_AGENT_TEAMS=1 is set — there is nothing to create or tear down. The team_name parameter is still accepted but ignored on the tools that took it (e.g. Agent), so older invocations don't error; omit it in new code. Coordination is otherwise unchanged: spawn teammates with the Agent tool, coordinate with SendMessage, and track work with TaskCreate/TaskList/TaskUpdate.

For the worked setup examples, communication snippets, shutdown procedures, the worktree path-resolution recovery routine, and common dispatch patterns, see REFERENCE.md.

When to Use This Skill

Use agent teams when...	Use subagents instead when...
Multiple agents need to work in parallel	Tasks are sequential and interdependent
Ongoing communication between agents is needed	One focused task produces one result
Background tasks need progress reporting	Agent output feeds directly into next step
Complex workflows benefit from task coordination	Simple, bounded, isolated execution
Independent changes to the same codebase (with worktrees)	Context sharing is fine and efficient

Sub-Agent Caveat: Spawn Teams from the Main Thread

Agent and the related parallel-spawn tools may not be present in a sub-agent's tool surface, even if the parent conversation has them. A sub-agent designed to orchestrate its own team can silently degrade to sequential single-thread execution — same content, ~5× longer wall-clock — without surfacing the failure until its post-completion summary.

Situation	Recommended pattern
Fan-out from the main conversation	Spawn parallel Agent calls directly — full tool surface available
Sub-agent orchestrating its own team	Avoid by design: split the work so the main thread does the fan-out
Sub-agent must orchestrate a team	Detect tool availability up front; report sequential fallback as a first-class outcome

Detection contract to brief into a coordinating sub-agent: confirm the Agent tool is callable; if not, do not silently fall back — report "Parallel fan-out unavailable in this sandbox; executed sequentially." as the first line of the summary, then continue sequentially with the same input contract. Plan top-level orchestration in the main conversation when you can.

Native Team Tools

The implicit team (2.1.178) needs no create/delete step — these tools operate on the one team the session already has:

Tool	Purpose
Agent	Spawn a teammate (give it a name; team_name is accepted but ignored)
SendMessage	Send DMs, broadcasts, shutdown requests, plan approvals
TaskCreate / TaskList / TaskUpdate	Create, discover, and assign/advance shared tasks
TaskOutput	Get output from a background agent
TaskStop	Stop a running background agent

The setup sequence — TaskCreate → spawn teammates via the Agent tool (with a name) → TaskUpdate to assign → receive results automatically — is shown with full code in REFERENCE.md → Team setup workflow. Teammate messages are delivered to the lead's inbox between turns; no polling needed.

Task Management

State	Meaning
pending	Not yet started
in_progress	Assigned and active (one at a time per teammate)
completed	Finished successfully
blocked	Waiting on another task (blocked_by field)

Teammates claim tasks in ID order (lowest first) via TaskList + TaskUpdate, and skip blocked tasks until their blocker completes.

Communication (SendMessage)

Type	Use When
message	Direct message to a specific teammate (recipient = name, not agentId)
broadcast	Critical team-wide announcement (N teammates = N round-trips — use sparingly)
shutdown_request / shutdown_response	Graceful teammate exit handshake
plan_approval_response	Approve or reject a teammate's plan

DM, broadcast, and discovery (Read ~/.claude/teams/<name>/config.json → members) examples are in REFERENCE.md → Communication.

Key Teammate Rules

• Mark exactly ONE task in_progress at a time.
• Use TaskUpdate (not SendMessage) to report task completion.
• Idle after every turn is normal — idle ≠ unavailable; a message wakes a teammate.
• All communication requires SendMessage — plain text output is NOT visible to the lead.
• Use the name field (not agentId) for recipient.

Lead Preflight Checklist

Before drafting the PRP and launching agents, a 30-second sweep prevents multi-edit renaming work after agents return:

Check	Command	Why
Next ADR/PRD/PRP sequence number	ls docs/blueprint/adrs/ | sort -V | tail -1	Prevents numbering collisions in parallel doc writes
Filename conflicts	git ls-files | grep <filename>	Scope tables can't guard against a stale mental model of the tree
Hardware pin budget (embedded)	Read pin_config.h or equivalent	Prevents pin assignments overlapping across Phase 1 agents

Out-of-Scope Discovery Protocol

Include the out-of-scope discovery protocol in every agent's prompt when that agent has an exclusive write scope — it prevents the "investigate out of scope → exhaust budget → truncated summary" failure mode. Copy the verbatim block from REFERENCE.md → Out-of-scope discovery protocol: the agent stops immediately on an out-of-scope dependency, lists it under an Out-of-scope dependencies summary section, and exits for the lead to triage.

Worktree Isolation Hazard

Worktree-isolated agents can have Edit/Write silently resolve relative paths against the parent repo instead of their worktree (upstream bug #1091), landing commits on the wrong branch with no immediate signal. Harden every worktree-isolated prompt with the absolute-path preamble, run the lead post-flight check (git diff origin/main..HEAD + git status --porcelain from the parent), and use the cherry-pick + rebase recovery — all in REFERENCE.md → Worktree path resolution. See also .claude/rules/agent-coworker-detection.md.

Resuming Worktree-Isolated Agents

SendMessage-resume of a completed worktree-isolated agent (Agent with isolation: "worktree") loses worktree isolation — the resumed run executes in the orchestrator's main checkout, not the worktree. For parallel file-mutating work, re-dispatch a fresh isolation: "worktree" agent instead of resuming; reserve SendMessage-resume for read-only / single-checkout continuations. See parallel-agent-dispatch → "Resuming agents: SendMessage loses worktree isolation" (issue #1546).

Sandbox Considerations

In web sessions (CLAUDE_CODE_REMOTE=true):

• Sub-agents (teammates) may encounter TLS errors on git push — delegate all push/PR operations to the lead.
• Each teammate runs in its own process context.
• Worktree isolation is recommended for independent filesystem changes.

Agentic Optimizations

Context	Approach
Quick parallel review	Spawn 2–4 teammates, assign tasks
Large codebase split	Assign directory subsets as separate tasks
Long-running work	Background teammates, poll via TaskList
Minimize API cost	Prefer message over broadcast
Fast shutdown	Send a shutdown_request to each teammate (no team teardown needed)

Quick Reference

Workflow Checklist

• CLAUDE_CODE_EXPERIMENTAL_AGENT_TEAMS=1 set (the implicit team exists; no create step)
• TaskCreate for each work unit
• Spawn teammates via the Agent tool with a name (no team_name needed)
• TaskUpdate to assign tasks (or let teammates self-assign)
• Receive messages automatically; respond via SendMessage
• SendMessage shutdown_request to each teammate when done (no TeamDelete)

Key Paths

Path	Contents
~/.claude/teams/	Implicit-team state (members: name, agentId, agentType)
~/.claude/tasks/	Shared task list state

Address teammates by the name you gave them at spawn — that is the reliable handle, independent of any on-disk layout.

Common Mistakes

Mistake	Correct Approach
Using agentId as recipient	Use the name given at spawn
Calling the removed TeamCreate/TeamDelete	The team is implicit (2.1.178); spawn with Agent, shut down with shutdown_request
Passing team_name and expecting routing	It is accepted but ignored — there is one implicit team
Sending broadcast for every update	Use message for single-recipient comms
Polling for messages	Messages delivered automatically — just wait
Sending JSON status messages	Use TaskUpdate for status, plain text for messages
Sub-agent pushes to remote	Delegate push to lead orchestrator

Related Skills and Rules

• parallel-agent-dispatch — worktree preflight, scope budgets, and the Return Contract every teammate must emit on exit. Team dispatches are a superset of plain parallel fan-out; follow both.
• .claude/rules/agent-development.md — agent file structure, model selection, worktree isolation
• .claude/rules/agentic-permissions.md — granular tool permission patterns
• .claude/rules/sandbox-guidance.md — web sandbox constraints and push delegation