Skills: Reusable Prompt Templates

Skills are pre-written prompts for tasks you do often. Instead of typing the same request every time, click a skill and it fills in the prompt for you. You can edit it before sending, or create your own.

Skills list showing prompt templates with category tags and a

How to Use a Skill

  1. Click the lightbulb icon in the composer
  2. Browse and click the skill you want
  3. Edit it if you need to (or just send as-is)
  4. Press Enter to send

You can also type / in the composer to search for skills. Search matches a skill's name first, then its tags, then the prompt body—so skills that open with similar wording (like "You are a sharp…") stay easy to tell apart by the name you gave them.

Skills Are Visible to the Model

As of v0.9.722, the AI knows what skills you have. When you enable a skill, its name, description, and body are injected into your mode's system prompt. This means you can ask the model things like "use your contract analysis skill on this PDF" without typing / or manually triggering the skill. The slash-search UX still works the same way; this just means the AI understands what skills it has and can reach for them when relevant.

Built-in Skills

Skill When to Use
Summarize Page Quick recap of a webpage you're reading
Weekly Planning Help organize your week
Explain Simply Break down complex topics into plain English
Draft Reply Write a professional email or message response
Proofread & Improve Fix grammar, tone, and clarity in your writing
Brainstorm Ideas Generate creative options for a project or problem

You can also install whole skill bundles from the Community Hub. For example, for Legal ships with 15 specialized legal skills you can install at once.

Create Your Own Skills

Repetitive prompts? Build a custom skill once and reuse it forever.

In Settings > Tools, Modes & Apps > Skills Library:

  1. Click "Create New Skill"
  2. Give it a Name—this is how the skill shows up in the list and the / menu, so make it distinct (e.g. "Contract Review", not whatever your prompt happens to start with)
  3. Add an optional description and tags
  4. Write your prompt (you can use {{variables}} like {{userName}} or {{currentDate}})
  5. Save it
  6. It shows up in your lightbulb menu next to the built-ins

Example: If you frequently ask the AI to write product descriptions for your Shopify store, create a skill called "Product Description" with a template that fills in product details.

Bundle Scripts With a Skill

A skill can carry working code alongside its prompt, so the AI runs something you've already tested instead of writing it fresh each time.

In the skill editor, under Bundled Scripts & Deterministic Tools, click Add Script. You can attach Python, SQL, JavaScript, TypeScript, and Bash scripts, or visual templates in HTML and CSS. Give each one a short description of what it does — that's how the AI knows when to reach for it. The skill list shows a 1 script / 3 scripts count so you can see at a glance which skills carry code.

Organize Your Skills

In Settings > Tools, Modes & Apps > Skills Library, you can:

  • Mark skills as favorites (they appear at the top of the menu)
  • Edit existing skills (yours or built-in ones)
  • Delete skills you don't use
  • Tidy up in bulk — tick the skills you want, then click Delete selected. Select all and Deselect all handle a long list, and a count shows how many are ticked
  • Assign skills to specific modes (so they only show in certain contexts)

Find a skill by typing. A library gets long once you have your own skills plus everything your installed apps ship, so the Skills Library has a search box above the list. It narrows as you type, matching a skill's name, description, tags, the app it came from, and the first line of its prompt — several words narrow further, so "draft email" finds only skills matching both. A count beside the box tells you how many skills you have and how many the search is showing, and Esc clears the box without reaching for the mouse.

A skill never arrives twice. Every skill carries a stable identity that is independent of the internal id it happens to be stored under, so reinstalling an app, restoring the built-in defaults, reinstalling Caiioo, taking a product update that rewords a built-in skill, or syncing a device that already had the same skill all land on the one entry instead of adding a copy. If a built-in skill has been edited, a re-seed leaves your version alone — updates only refresh the built-ins you have not touched. Devices that already accumulated duplicates are merged on the next launch: the most recently edited copy wins, its favorite status and mode assignments are preserved, and the removal syncs to your other devices rather than coming back.

The Skills list defaults to showing every skill across all modes—including the mode-scoped skills that installed Hub apps bring in—so nothing stays hidden behind a filter. Each mode-scoped skill carries a mode badge showing which mode(s) it belongs to, so you can see at a glance where the agent will reach for it. Skills with no mode assignment are global and show no badge.

See Also

  • Variables — How to use variables in your skills

This guide is maintained by the Caiioo team using Slate, our built-in editor.