GitHub Copilot¶

Tool-specific reference for GitHub Copilot's agentic features.

Pages¶

Agent Mission Control — Centralized dashboard for assigning, steering, and tracking coding agent tasks across repositories
Copilot CLI BYOK and Local Model Support — Connect Copilot CLI to any OpenAI-compatible provider or run fully local models for cost control, data residency, and offline workflows
Agent Mode — Local, synchronous agentic execution in VS Code, JetBrains, Eclipse, and Xcode
Inline Agent Mode in JetBrains — Public-preview surface that runs agent capabilities inside the JetBrains inline chat popover instead of the chat panel
Cloud Agent Organization Controls — Three-tier governance model for runner configuration, firewall policy, and commit traceability
Cloud Agent: Research, Plan, and Code Phases — Three-phase execution model with explicit developer checkpoints between Research, Plan, and Code
Coding Agent — Asynchronous agent that works via GitHub Actions to plan, implement, and open PRs
Copilot Dedicated App (Desktop) — Standalone Windows/macOS/Linux desktop client where the agent session is the primary tenant of the window; one thin client over backend-held session state, not a unified app spanning web, mobile, and IDE
Copilot Extensions — Build agents and skillsets that integrate into Copilot Chat via GitHub Marketplace (deprecated — see migration guide)
copilot-instructions.md Convention — Repository-level instruction file for persistent project context
Copilot Spaces — Named context collections that ground Copilot in curated reference material across repositories, files, PRs, issues, and uploads
Custom Agents, Skills & Plugins — Define specialized agents, reusable skills, and installable bundles
Dependabot Agent Assignment — Route Dependabot alerts to Copilot for autonomous fix generation with human review at merge
Managing Agent Skills from the GitHub CLI — Install, pin, update, and publish agent skills with gh skill for scriptable provisioning
MCP Integration — Connect Copilot to external tools via Model Context Protocol
Monorepo Skill and Agent Discovery — Hierarchical configuration discovery from working directory to git root, enabling per-package skills and MCP servers
Unified Sessions View and CLI Agent in JetBrains — Chat-window registry aggregating CLI agent, agent mode, custom agent, and sub-agent sessions with worktree or workspace isolation