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[FEATURE]: Agent-specific instructions array #10688
Description
Feature hasn't been suggested before.
- I have verified this feature I'm about to request hasn't been suggested before.
Describe the enhancement you want to request
Problem
It's currently not possible to add instructions scoped to a single built-in agent without overriding its entire system prompt. agent.<name>.prompt replaces the base prompt, while AGENTS.md and instructions are applied globally across all agents.
Example use case -- adding instruction "Always use Researcher agent for looking up information" only to the build agent (so that context of the researcher agent is not polluted, and it doesn't use subagents where not necessary)
Request:
Add an agent.<name>.instructions array that behaves like global instructions array, but only for that agent.
Example:
{
"agent": {
"build": {
"instructions": [
"~/.config/opencode/prompts/build-only.md"
]
}
}
}Rationale:
- Enables per-agent customization without losing default prompts.
- Avoids global rules affecting unrelated agents.
- Keeps config composable and avoids duplicating the entire default system prompt.
Reacted by ISAI, wachpawnmeh, Weilu Jia, Aleksandr, Aleksandar Kanchev, Michael R. Lucas, Sergey Kostrukov and Dmitriy Zharikhin
Activity
[-][FEATURE]: Agent-specific `instructions` array (global)[/-][+][FEATURE]: Agent-specific `instructions` array[/+]github-actions commentedon Jan 26, 2026
This issue might be a duplicate of existing issues. Please check:
Feel free to ignore if none of these address your specific case.
marchellodev commentedon Jan 26, 2026
If this is something opencode should support, here's a PR -- #10695
Thanks!
marchellodev commentedon Jan 26, 2026
This other PR #7310 indeed does something similar, but we already support the global
instructionsarray, so this approach (of simply extending it to be agent-specific) feels cleanergithub-actions commentedon Mar 29, 2026
To stay organized issues are automatically closed after 90 days of no activity. If the issue is still relevant please open a new one.