AGENTS.md best practices for coding agents (ANSWERED)
AGENTS.md is becoming the de facto 'README for agents.'
Read full explanationWhat belongs in AGENTS.md, why concise files win, company-wide templates, and securing agent config against repo attacks.
AGENTS.md is becoming the standard onboarding file for coding agents — a README written for Claude Code, Cursor agents, Codex CLI, and internal runtimes.
Interviews ask what belongs in the file, how to keep it short, how to roll it out across hundreds of repos, and how to stop attackers from poisoning AGENTS.md or related configs (.mcp.json, .cursor/rules).
Research nuance to cite: AGENTS.md is valuable when concise and focused; oversized instruction dumps can raise cost and hurt success rates. This guide covers best practices and secure AGENTS.md — high-signal topics for AI tooling and platform roles.
Deep explanations with architecture diagrams for every question below.
AGENTS.md is becoming the de facto 'README for agents.'
Read full explanationRepository configuration attacks target the files agents trust.
Read full explanation