find-skills

name	find-skills
description	Helps users discover and install agent skills when they ask questions like "how do I do X", "find a skill for X", "is there a skill that can...", or express interest in extending capabilities. This skill should be used when the user is looking for functionality that might exist as an installable skill.

Find Skills

This skill helps you discover and install skills from the open agent skills ecosystem.

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when the user:

• Asks "how do I do X" where X might be a common task with an existing skill
• Says "find a skill for X" or "is there a skill for X"
• Asks "can you do X" where X is a specialized capability
• Expresses interest in extending agent capabilities
• Wants to search for tools, templates, or workflows
• Mentions they wish they had help with a specific domain (design, testing, deployment, etc.)

What is the Skills CLI?

The Skills CLI (npx skills) is the package manager for the open agent skills ecosystem. Skills are modular packages that extend agent capabilities with specialized knowledge, workflows, and tools.

Key commands:

• npx skills find [query] - Search for skills interactively or by keyword
• npx skills add <package> - Install a skill from GitHub or other sources
• npx skills check - Check for skill updates
• npx skills update - Update all installed skills

Browse skills at: https://skills.sh/

For workflow/tooling explanations with user-facing flows, request lifecycles, architecture, data flow, or multi-step sequences, include a meaningful Mermaid diagram plus concise prose unless the user requested prose only or the response is trivial. Workflow Suite renders diagrams in a uniform dark-mode visual style; use concise labels and do not hardcode random light styling unless explicitly requested.

How to Help Users Find Skills

Step 1: Understand What They Need

When a user asks for help with something, identify:

1. The domain (e.g., React, testing, design, deployment)
2. The specific task (e.g., writing tests, creating animations, reviewing PRs)
3. Whether this is a common enough task that a skill likely exists

Step 2: Check the Leaderboard First

Before running a CLI search, check the skills.sh leaderboard to see if a well-known skill already exists for the domain. The leaderboard ranks skills by total installs, surfacing the most popular and battle-tested options.

For example, top skills for web development include:

• vercel-labs/agent-skills — React, Next.js, web design (100K+ installs each)
• anthropics/skills — Frontend design, document processing (100K+ installs)

Step 3: Search for Skills

If the leaderboard doesn't cover the user's need, run the find command:

npx skills find [query]

For example:

• User asks "how do I make my React app faster?" → npx skills find react performance
• User asks "can you help me with PR reviews?" → npx skills find pr review
• User asks "I need to create a changelog" → npx skills find changelog

Step 4: Verify Quality Before Recommending

Do not recommend a skill based solely on search results. Always verify:

1. Install count — Prefer skills with 1K+ installs. Be cautious with anything under 100.
2. Source reputation — Official sources (vercel-labs, anthropics, microsoft) are more trustworthy than unknown authors.
3. GitHub stars — Check the source repository. A skill from a repo with <100 stars should be treated with skepticism.

Step 5: Present Options to the User

When you find relevant skills, present them to the user with:

1. The skill name and what it does
2. The install count and source
3. The install command they can run
4. A link to learn more at skills.sh

Example response:

I found a skill that might help! The "react-best-practices" skill provides
React and Next.js performance optimization guidelines from Vercel Engineering.
(185K installs)

To install it:
npx skills add vercel-labs/agent-skills@react-best-practices

Learn more: https://skills.sh/vercel-labs/agent-skills/react-best-practices

Step 6: Offer to Install

If the user wants to proceed, you can install the skill for them:

npx skills add <owner/repo@skill> -g -y

The -g flag installs globally (user-level) and -y skips confirmation prompts.

Common Skill Categories

When searching, consider these common categories:

Category	Example Queries
Web Development	react, nextjs, typescript, css, tailwind
Testing	testing, jest, playwright, e2e
DevOps	deploy, docker, kubernetes, ci-cd
Documentation	docs, readme, changelog, api-docs
Code Quality	review, lint, refactor, best-practices
Design	ui, ux, design-system, accessibility
Productivity	workflow, automation, git

Tips for Effective Searches

1. Use specific keywords: "react testing" is better than just "testing"
2. Try alternative terms: If "deploy" doesn't work, try "deployment" or "ci-cd"
3. Check popular sources: Many skills come from vercel-labs/agent-skills or ComposioHQ/awesome-claude-skills

When No Skills Are Found

If no relevant skills exist:

1. Acknowledge that no existing skill was found
2. Offer to help with the task directly using your general capabilities
3. Suggest the user could create their own skill with npx skills init

Example:

I searched for skills related to "xyz" but didn't find any matches.
I can still help you with this task directly! Would you like me to proceed?

If this is something you do often, you could create your own skill:
npx skills init my-xyz-skill

Professional Constraints

• Check project instructions before recommendations when the task touches code, docs, settings, or workflow behavior.
• Keep scope bounded to the user request and approved workflow phase.
• Do not print secrets, credentials, tokens, auth/session values, private runtime state, or .env contents.
• Avoid destructive commands, deploys, pushes, resets, cleans, database mutations, and dependency installs unless explicitly approved outside this workflow.
• Prefer concise, evidence-based output with exact files or commands reviewed.

Skills vs Agents

Use this skill as in-process guidance for the current model. Use a sub-agent only when the task benefits from an isolated context window, parallel read-only research, forced preflight, or independent validation. Do not use both this skill and a same-purpose agent for the same narrow job unless the workflow or user explicitly requires it.