# Getting started with skills

## About skills

A skill is a packaged set of instructions an agent loads when it recognizes a relevant task, so it follows a proven recipe instead of reasoning through the workflow from scratch. They don't add new MCP capabilities; they just give agents more Airtable expertise.

All of Airtable's skills are open source in the [`airtable/skills`](https://github.com/airtable/skills) repo. They're written by Airtable experts to help agents get things done more effectively in Airtable.

For example, `airtable-filters` teaches an agent how to query records with the right operators and ID formats, `airtable-overview` explains Airtable's data model, and solution skills like `product-ops`, `sales-ops`, and `marketing-ops` stand up and run a complete system in Airtable using best practices we've learned over the years.

## Plugins are the best way to stay up to date

The fastest way to get Airtable's skills is to install them as a plugin.

**Install as a plugin (recommended).** Plugins bundle the skills together and stay connected to the source, so when Airtable ships new skills or improves existing ones your agent picks up the updates automatically — no manual re-syncing, and you install the whole set at once. This is the right choice for almost everyone.

You can check whether your AI tool supports plugins in [MCP server overview](/developers/agents/mcp/getting-started).

**For Cursor, OpenCode, Pi, Gemini CLI, or any other agent that consumes [Agent Skills](https://agentskills.io/home):**

Pull the skills directly from the [`airtable/skills`](https://github.com/airtable/skills) repo:

```bash
# All skills
npx skills add airtable/skills

# A specific skill
npx skills add airtable/skills --skill airtable-filters
```

This copies the skills into your project as a point-in-time snapshot. It's useful when you want a specific skill or need to vendor a fixed version, but those copies won't update on their own — you'll have to re-pull to get improvements.

## What's in the catalog

Airtable's skills fall into two groups.

**Core skills** are the foundations. They teach an agent the Airtable data model and the mechanics of working with your data, and they're designed to be composed into larger workflows.

-   **Airtable overview** — what Airtable is and how bases, tables, fields, records, views, automations, and interfaces fit together.
-   **Airtable filters** — how to find, filter, and narrow down records by field value, with the correct operators and ID formats for each field type.

**Solution skills** are end-to-end workflows for a job to be done. They build on the core skills to set up and operate a complete system in Airtable.

-   **Product ops** — roadmap management, feedback intake, launch coordination, and prioritization.
-   **Sales ops** — pipelines, account and renewal management, deal desk, and forecasting.
-   **Marketing ops** — request intake, campaign orchestration, content calendars, and budget and ROI tracking.

## Why use skills

An agent connected to the MCP server can do a lot on its own, but it has to reason through every workflow from scratch — picking tools, sequencing steps, and inferring conventions like how to filter a linked-record field or best practices for navigating an Interface. Skills close that gap.

As what you build in Airtable grows, you may want to write skills for your own workflows, they work well alongside the officially-supported Airtable skills.