# Introducing Spice Skills for AI Agents

Wyatt Wenzel

DevRel & Ops Leader at Spice AIMarch 26, 2026

We're excited to introduce [Spice Skills](https://github.com/spiceai/skills), an open-source collection of packaged instructions for AI coding agents working with [Spice.ai OSS](https://github.com/spiceai/spiceai). Each skill covers a specific capability -- [federated SQL queries](/content/platform/sql-federation-acceleration/index.html), data acceleration, [vector and full-text search](/content/platform/hybrid-sql-search/index.html), [LLM inference](/content/platform/llm-inference/index.html), and [MCP tool use](/content/feature/mcp-server-gateway/index.html) -- so agents can configure and operate Spice correctly without manual prompting.

Skills follow the open [Agent Skills](https://agentskills.io/) format and work with Claude Code via [Claude Skills](https://code.claude.com/docs/en/skills), Cursor, and any agent that supports the standard.

## What's Included

The initial release covers the core Spice workflows:

| Skill                  | What the agent can do                                                          |
|------------------------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| `spice-setup`         | Install Spice, initialize a project, and run the runtime                      |
| `spice-connect-data`  | Connect to data sources and query across them with federated SQL              |
| `spice-acceleration`  | Accelerate data locally for sub-second query performance                       |
| `spice-search`        | Search with vector similarity, full-text keywords, or hybrid RRF              |
| `spice-ai`            | Add AI capabilities -- chat, text-to-SQL, tools, memory, model routing       |
| `spice-caching`       | Cache query and search results with TTL and stale-while-revalidate            |
| `spice-secrets`       | Manage credentials with secret stores                                          |
| `spice-text-to-sql`   | Convert natural language to SQL using the /v1/nsql endpoint                  |
| `spice-terraform`     | Provision and manage Spice infrastructure with Terraform                       |

Each skill ships as a `SKILL.md` -- instructions the agent reads directly -- along with optional helper scripts and example configurations.

## Installation

**Claude Code ( [Claude Skills](https://code.claude.com/docs/en/skills)):**
```
/plugin marketplace add spiceai/skills
/plugin install spice@spiceai-skills
```
Skills become available as `/spice:spice-setup`, `/spice:spice-ai`, `/spice:spicepod-config`, and so on.

**Other agents (npx):**
```
npx skills add spiceai/skills
```
Once installed, skills are invoked automatically when the agent detects a relevant task -- no manual prompting required.

## Why Skills

Working with a new runtime in an AI coding agent typically means copy-pasting docs, correcting hallucinated API shapes, and re-explaining configuration patterns. Skills solve this by giving the agent accurate, structured knowledge up front.
For Spice specifically, this matters because the configuration surface is broad: 30+ data connectors, multiple acceleration engines, LLM providers, embedding models, and a growing set of tools. For teams building [retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) pipelines](/content/use-case/retrieval-augmented-generation/index.html) or [agentic AI applications](/content/use-case/secure-ai-agents/index.html), a well-scoped skill keeps the agent on the right path without requiring the developer to re-explain Spice's configuration model each session.

## Skill Structure

Each skill follows a consistent layout:
```
spice-setup/
  SKILL.md           # Agent instructions
  scripts/           # Helper automation (optional)
  examples/          # Example spicepod.yaml configurations (optional)
```
The format is intentionally minimal. `SKILL.md` is plain text the agent can parse; scripts handle anything that benefits from automation.

## Get Started

The skills repository is open source at [github.com/spiceai/skills](https://github.com/spiceai/skills). Contributions for additional connectors, deployment patterns, and Spice Cloud workflows are welcome.

- [Spice.ai OSS Docs](https://docs.spiceai.org/)
- [Spice Cookbook](https://github.com/spiceai/cookbook)

### Spice AI Skills FAQ

##### What is Spice Skills?
Spice Skills is an open-source collection of packaged instructions for AI coding agents working with Spice.ai OSS. Each skill is a `SKILL.md` file that gives an agent structured knowledge about a specific capability -- so it can configure datasets, connect data sources, run federated queries, and set up models without requiring manual prompting from the developer.

##### Which AI coding agents support Spice Skills?
Spice Skills work with any agent that supports the [Agent Skills](https://agentskills.io/) format. Claude Code installs via the plugin marketplace (`/plugin marketplace add spiceai/skills`). Any other agent can add skills using `npx skills add spiceai/skills`.

##### Is Spice Skills free to use?
Yes. The repository is MIT-licensed and open source at [github.com/spiceai/skills](https://github.com/spiceai/skills). The AI coding agent tools you use are subject to their own licensing.

##### How does Spice Skills differ from reading the Spice documentation?
Documentation is written for humans to read. Skills are structured for agents to parse -- scoped to specific tasks, paired with helper scripts and example configs, and automatically invoked when a relevant task is detected. An agent with an installed skill does not need the developer to re-explain Spice's configuration model each session.

##### Can I build and contribute custom Spice Skills?
Yes. Each skill follows a minimal structure: a `SKILL.md` with agent instructions, an optional `scripts/` directory, and optional `examples/`. Contributions for additional connectors, deployment patterns, and Spice Cloud workflows are welcome via pull request to [github.com/spiceai/skills](https://github.com/spiceai/skills).