Kiro ships with built-in agents for common development workflows. These use the same agent framework as custom agents but are pre-configured and maintained by Kiro. You can switch between them during a session or invoke them with dedicated UI controls and slash commands.
| Agent | IDE | CLI | Purpose |
|---|---|---|---|
| Default | ✓ | ✓ | General-purpose coding assistant |
| Spec | ✓ | ✓ | Structured feature development (requirements, design, tasks) |
| Quick Spec | ✓ | ✓ | Fast spec workflow - auto-generates all phases without approval gates |
| Bug Fix | ✓ | ✓ | Structured bug investigation and resolution |
| Plan | ✓ | ✓ | Read-only planning before execution |
| Guide | — | ✓ | Documentation-grounded CLI help (terminal UI) |
| Help | — | ✓ | Documentation-grounded CLI help (classic interface) |
The default agent is the general-purpose assistant that starts with every session. It has access to all built-in tools, MCP servers, and your workspace context. Most development tasks - writing code, debugging, refactoring, answering questions - happen here.
You don't need to invoke it explicitly; it's the starting point for all sessions.
The Spec, Quick Spec, and Bug Fix agents produce formal requirements, design, and task documents stored in .kiro/specs/. They guide you through structured phases with approval gates between each one.
When starting a new session, the "Let's build" screen shows workflow options under "Start with a workflow":
| Workflow | What it produces |
|---|---|
| Spec | Requirements → design → tasks with approval gates between phases |
| Quick Spec | All three phases auto-generated without gates - fastest path to implementation |
| Bug Fix | Root cause analysis → fix design → implementation tasks |
Select a workflow to start a session with that agent. You can also invoke specs mid-session by clicking Build with spec in the chat input area.
For the full guide on structured development workflows, see Specs.
Plan mode helps you think before you act. It operates in read-only mode - exploring your codebase, gathering requirements, and producing implementation plans without making any changes. Once you approve, it hands off to the default agent for execution.
Select Plan from the workflow selector when starting a new session, or switch to it mid-session using the agent picker in the chat input bar (click the agent name, e.g., "Default", and select Plan).
| Operation | Available |
|---|---|
| File reading, code intelligence, search | ✓ |
| Web search | ✓ |
| File writing, command execution, MCP tools | — |
For the full Plan mode workflow and best practices, see Plan mode.
The Guide agent provides documentation-grounded answers about Kiro. Unlike the default agent's general knowledge, the Guide agent searches indexed documentation that matches your installed version.
> /guide
Press Shift+Tab to return to your previous agent.
.kiro/The Guide agent uses the introspect tool - hybrid search (semantic + BM25) over indexed documentation embedded at compile time.
The Help agent provides the same documentation-grounded assistance as the Guide agent but in the classic (non-TUI) interface. Invoke with /help or /help <question>.
When you open a new session, the "Let's build" screen offers workflow options:
Selecting a workflow automatically switches the active agent for that session. You can also switch agents mid-session by clicking the agent name (e.g., "Default") in the bottom bar of the chat pane to open the agent picker.
Built-in agents demonstrate how Kiro uses agent configurations for specialized workflows. You can create your own agents with the same capabilities - tailored tools, permissions, prompts, and models for your specific workflows.
See Creating custom agents to get started.
Built-in agents