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What are Skills?

Skills are reusable sets of instructions that tell Langdock how to handle a specific task. When a skill is active in your chat, the AI reads its instructions and follows them — every time, without you having to explain them again. Think of a skill as a briefing document: instead of writing “always structure your answers like this…” or “when I ask for a status update, use these three sections…” in every conversation, you write it once as a skill and Langdock applies it automatically. Good use cases for skills:
  • Recurring outputs — status reports, meeting notes, project summaries
  • Formatting rules — always use bullet points, always reply in a specific language, always cite sources
  • Workflow guidance — how to handle a support ticket, how to draft a contract clause
  • Integration workflows — a Gmail skill that gives the AI access to read and send emails automatically
  • Team standards — share a skill so everyone gets consistent outputs

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How skills work in a chat

When you start a chat, all your active skills are available in the background. The AI decides on its own which skill is relevant to your message, reads its instructions, and responds accordingly. You don’t have to say “use the status report skill.” Just ask for a status report — if the skill’s description matches, the AI will use it automatically. You can see which skills are currently active in the chat input bar. Click the skills indicator to review or temporarily disable individual skills for that session.
Skills work best when the task is well-defined and you do it often. They are not a replacement for detailed prompting on complex, one-off questions.

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Creating a skill

You need the Editor role or higher to create skills. There are three ways:

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Write instructions directly

Go to Skills in the sidebar and click Add Skill → Write skill instructions. Fill in:
FieldDescription
NameA short human-readable title, e.g. “Weekly Status Report”
HandleThe internal identifier the AI uses, auto-derived from the name (e.g. weekly-status-report). Lowercase letters, numbers, and dashes only.
DescriptionOne or two sentences describing when this skill should be used. The AI reads this to decide whether to activate the skill.
InstructionsThe actual content: what to do, how to format the output, what to include or avoid. Plain text or Markdown.
IntegrationsOptionally attach integrations whose actions become available when this skill is active.
The description is critical. “Generate weekly status reports from recent work. Use when asked for updates or progress summaries.” is much more effective than “Status reports.” The more specific the description, the more reliably the AI activates the skill at the right moment.

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Upload a SKILL.md file

Skills can be packaged as a SKILL.md file (Markdown with a metadata block at the top) or a .zip archive for skills that include supporting files. Go to Skills → Add Skill → Upload a skill and drag in your file. 
---
name: Weekly Status Report
slug: weekly-status-report
description: Generate weekly status reports from recent work. Use when asked for updates or progress summaries.
---

Summarize recent work in three sections: **Wins**, **Blockers**, and **Next steps**.
Keep the tone professional but not stiff.

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Create with chat

Go to Skills → Add Skill → Create with chat to describe the skill you want in plain language and let Langdock generate the instructions for you.

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Writing good instructions

The quality of a skill depends almost entirely on the quality of its instructions:
  • Be specific about the output. Don’t say “summarize things.” Say “write a three-section summary with: (1) key decisions made, (2) open questions, (3) next steps. Each section should be 3–5 bullet points.”
  • Write the description as if explaining to a new colleague. Vague descriptions cause the AI to activate the skill at the wrong time — or not at all.
  • Test before sharing. Install the skill, start a new chat, and see if the AI behaves as expected. Adjust based on what you observe.
  • Keep instructions focused. A skill that does one thing well is more reliable than one that tries to cover many cases.

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Installing and enabling skills

Skills shared with you (or workspace-wide skills) appear on the Skills page. Click Install to add a skill to your account. Once installed, toggle each skill on or off from the Skills page or from within a chat using the skills indicator in the input bar.
Workspace-mandated skills show a lock icon and cannot be disabled — they are always active for everyone in the workspace.

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Sharing skills

Open a skill’s detail view and click Share to share it with specific people, groups, or your entire workspace.
ActionPermission required
Share with individuals or groupsshareSkills (all roles)
Share workspace-wideshareSkillsWithWorkspace (admins only)
Sharing makes a skill discoverable — users still need to install it themselves. To force a skill on for everyone with no option to disable it, admins can Apply to workspace in the admin settings at Settings → Workspace → Products → Skills.

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Skills and integrations

When you create a skill, you can attach integrations to it. When the skill is active and the AI reads its instructions, those integrations’ actions automatically become available for that conversation — without you having to add them manually each time. For example: a Gmail skill linked to your Gmail integration gives the AI access to read and send emails whenever the skill is active.

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Limitations

WhatLimit
Active skills per user20
Workspace-applied skills8
Skill name64 characters
Description1,024 characters
Instructions50,000 characters
Upload size (ZIP)25 MB
Uncompressed bundle size10 MB
What skills can’t do:
  • Skills don’t run code. Scripts included in a bundle are reference material only — they are not executed. Use the Data Analyst or Bash tools for code execution.
  • Skills don’t have memory across sessions. Instructions are re-read fresh each conversation. For persistent memory, use Chat Memory.
  • Skills can’t access live data on their own. Unless linked to an integration, a skill only provides instructions — it doesn’t fetch real-time information.
  • No version history. When you update a skill’s instructions, the previous version is not saved.

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Frequently asked questions

No. Active skills are automatically considered by the AI on every message. If the skill’s description matches your request, it will be used without you referencing it by name.
Yes. All your installed and enabled skills are available in every chat. The AI decides which ones are relevant per message.
The AI will try to follow both, which may produce inconsistent results. If you notice conflicting behavior, disable the skill that’s less relevant for that session using the skills indicator in the chat input bar.
No — personal skills are private by default. They only become visible to others when you explicitly share them.
The most common reason is a vague description. The AI uses the description to decide whether to activate a skill. Rewrite it to be more specific about when it should apply — include concrete trigger phrases like “when asked for updates” or “when drafting a reply to a customer.”