AI agents vs. workflows vs. skills: what's the difference
Three words that get used interchangeably but mean genuinely different things in the agent ecosystem.
An agent is a piece of software that can plan and take actions toward a goal, usually with some autonomy over what it does next. A skill is a packaged, reusable capability you add to an agent, a specific thing it now knows how to do well, like generating a PDF or reviewing code against a checklist. A workflow is a description of how multiple agents, tools, and skills combine to accomplish something end to end, like turning a meeting transcript into filed tickets.
The distinction matters for evaluation: you choose an agent for its general judgment, a skill for a specific repeatable task, and a workflow for a whole process you want to stop doing by hand. Browse agents, skills, and workflows to see the difference in practice.