Context Engineering

Context engineering is the process of designing and controlling the information (context) that is sent to language models to guide their behavior and outputs. In practice, building context comes down to one question: “Which information is most likely to achieve the desired outcome?” In Agno, this means carefully crafting the system message, which includes the team’s description, instructions, member information, and other relevant settings. By thoughtfully constructing this context, you can:

Steer the team toward specific behaviors or roles.
Constrain or expand the team’s capabilities.
Ensure outputs are consistent, relevant, and aligned with your application’s needs.
Enable advanced use cases such as multi-step reasoning, member delegation, tool use, or structured output.
Coordinate team members effectively for collaborative tasks.

Effective context engineering is an iterative process: refining the system message, trying out different descriptions and instructions, and using features such as schemas, delegation, and tool integrations. The context of an Agno team consists of the following:

System message: The system message is the main context that is sent to the team, including all additional context
User message: The user message is the message that is sent to the team.
Chat history: The chat history is the history of the conversation between the team and the user.
Additional input: Any few-shot examples or other additional input that is added to the context.

System message context

The following are some key parameters that are used to create the system message:

Description: A description that guides the overall behaviour of the team.
Instructions: A list of precise, task-specific instructions on how to achieve its goal.
Expected Output: A description of the expected output from the Team.
Members: Information about team members, their roles, and capabilities.

The system message is built from the team’s description, instructions, member details, and other settings. A team leader’s system message additionally includes delegation rules and coordination guidelines. For example:

instructions.py

from agno.agent import Agent
from agno.team import Team
from agno.tools.duckduckgo import DuckDuckGoTools
from agno.tools.hackernews import HackerNewsTools

web_agent = Agent(
    name="Web Researcher",
    role="You are a web researcher that can find information on the web.",
    instructions=[
        "Use your web search tool to find information on the web.",
        "Provide a summary of the information found.",
    ],
    tools=[DuckDuckGoTools()],
    markdown=True,
    debug_mode=True,  # Set to True to view the detailed logs
)
hackernews_agent = Agent(
    name="HackerNews Researcher",
    role="You are a hackernews researcher that can find information on hackernews.",
    instructions=[
        "Use your hackernews search tool to find information on hackernews.",
        "Provide a summary of the information found.",
    ],
    tools=[HackerNewsTools()],
    markdown=True,
    debug_mode=True,  # Set to True to view the detailed logs
)

team = Team(
    members=[web_agent, hackernews_agent],
    instructions=[
        "You are a team of researchers that can find information on the web and hackernews.",
        "After finding information about the topic, compile a joint report."
    ],
    markdown=True,
    debug_mode=True,   # Set to True to view the detailed logs and see the compiled system message
)
team.print_response("What is the latest news on the crypto market?", stream=True)

Will produce the following system message:

You are the leader of a team and sub-teams of AI Agents.
Your task is to coordinate the team to complete the user's request.

Here are the members in your team:
<team_members>
- Agent 1:
    - ID: web-researcher
    - Name: Web Researcher
    - Role: You are a web researcher that can find information on the web.
    - Member tools:
        - duckduckgo_search
        - duckduckgo_news
- Agent 2:
    - ID: hacker-news-researcher
    - Name: HackerNews Researcher
    - Role: You are a hackernews researcher that can find information on hackernews.
    - Member tools:
        - get_top_hackernews_stories
        - get_user_details
</team_members>

<how_to_respond>
- Your role is to forward tasks to members in your team with the highest likelihood of completing the user's request.
- Carefully analyze the tools available to the members and their roles before delegating tasks.
- You cannot use a member tool directly. You can only delegate tasks to members.
- When you delegate a task to another member, make sure to include:
    - member_id (str): The ID of the member to delegate the task to. Use only the ID of the member, not the ID of the team followed by the ID of the
member.
    - task_description (str): A clear description of the task.
    - expected_output (str): The expected output.
- You can delegate tasks to multiple members at once.
- You must always analyze the responses from members before responding to the user.
- After analyzing the responses from the members, if you feel the task has been completed, you can stop and respond to the user.
- If you are not satisfied with the responses from the members, you should re-assign the task.
- For simple greetings, thanks, or questions about the team itself, you should respond directly.
- For all work requests, tasks, or questions requiring expertise, route to appropriate team members.
</how_to_respond>

<instructions>
- You are a team of researchers that can find information on the web and hackernews.
- After finding information about the topic, compile a joint report.
</instructions>

<additional_information>
- Use markdown to format your answers.
</additional_information>

System message Parameters

The Team creates a default system message that can be customized using the following parameters:

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
`description`	`str`	`None`	A description of the Team that is added to the start of the system message.
`instructions`	`List[str]`	`None`	List of instructions added to the system prompt in `<instructions>` tags. Default instructions are also created depending on values for `markdown`, `expected_output` etc.
`additional_context`	`str`	`None`	Additional context added to the end of the system message.
`expected_output`	`str`	`None`	Provide the expected output from the Team. This is added to the end of the system message.
`markdown`	`bool`	`False`	Add an instruction to format the output using markdown.
`add_datetime_to_context`	`bool`	`False`	If True, add the current datetime to the prompt to give the team a sense of time. This allows for relative times like “tomorrow” to be used in the prompt
`add_name_to_context`	`bool`	`False`	If True, add the name of the team to the context.
`add_location_to_context`	`bool`	`False`	If True, add the location of the team to the context. This allows for location-aware responses and local context.
`timezone_identifier`	`str`	`None`	Allows for custom timezone for datetime instructions following the TZ Database format (e.g. “Etc/UTC”)
`add_member_tools_to_context`	`bool`	`True`	If True, add the tools available to team members to the context.
`add_session_summary_to_context`	`bool`	`False`	If True, add the session summary to the context. See sessions for more information.
`add_memories_to_context`	`bool`	`False`	If True, add the user memories to the context. See memory for more information.
`add_dependencies_to_context`	`bool`	`False`	If True, add the dependencies to the context. See dependencies for more information.
`add_session_state_to_context`	`bool`	`False`	If True, add the session state to the context. See state for more information.
`add_knowledge_to_context`	`bool`	`False`	If True, add retrieved knowledge to the context, to enable RAG. See knowledge for more information.
`enable_agentic_knowledge_filters`	`bool`	`False`	If True, let the team choose the knowledge filters. See knowledge for more information.
`system_message`	`str`	`None`	Override the default system message.
`respond_directly`	`bool`	`False`	If True, the team leader won’t process responses from members and instead will return them directly.
`delegate_task_to_all_members`	`bool`	`False`	If True, the team leader will delegate the task to all members, instead of deciding for a subset.
`determine_input_for_members`	`bool`	`True`	Set to false if you want to send the run input directly to the member agents.
`share_member_interactions`	`bool`	`False`	If True, send all previous member interactions to members.
`get_member_information_tool`	`bool`	`False`	If True, add a tool to get information about the team members.

See the full Team reference for more information.

How the system message is built

Lets take the following example team:

from agno.agent import Agent
from agno.team import Team

web_agent = Agent(
    name="Web Researcher",
    role="You are a web researcher that can find information on the web.",
    description="You are a helpful web research assistant",
    instructions=["Search for accurate information"],
    markdown=True,
)

team = Team(
    members=[web_agent],
    name="Research Team",
    role="Team Lead",
    description="You are a research team lead",
    instructions=["Coordinate the team to provide comprehensive research"],
    expected_output="You should format your response with detailed findings",
    markdown=True,
    add_datetime_to_context=True,
    add_location_to_context=True,
    add_name_to_context=True,
    add_session_summary_to_context=True,
    add_memories_to_context=True,
    add_session_state_to_context=True,
)

Below is the system message that will be built:

You are the leader of a team and sub-teams of AI Agents.
Your task is to coordinate the team to complete the user's request.

Here are the members in your team:
<team_members>
- Agent 1:
    - ID: web-researcher
    - Name: Web Researcher
    - Role: You are a web researcher that can find information on the web.
    - Member tools:
        (none)
</team_members>

<how_to_respond>
...
</how_to_respond>

You have access to memories from previous interactions with the user that you can use:

<memories_from_previous_interactions>
- User really likes Digimon and Japan.
- User really likes Japan.
- User likes coffee.
</memories_from_previous_interactions>

Note: this information is from previous interactions and may be updated in this conversation. You should always prefer information from this conversation over the past memories.

Here is a brief summary of your previous interactions:

<summary_of_previous_interactions>
The user asked about information about Digimon and Japan.
</summary_of_previous_interactions>

Note: this information is from previous interactions and may be outdated. You should ALWAYS prefer information from this conversation over the past summary.

<description>
You are a research team lead
</description>

<your_role>
Team Lead
</your_role>

<instructions>
- Coordinate the team to provide comprehensive research
</instructions>

<additional_information>
- Use markdown to format your answers.
- The current time is 2025-09-30 12:00:00.
- Your approximate location is: New York, NY, USA.
- Your name is: Research Team.
</additional_information>

<expected_output>
You should format your response with detailed findings
</expected_output>

<session_state> ... </session_state>

This example is exhaustive and illustrates what is possible with the system message, however in practice you would only use some of these settings.

Additional Context

You can add additional context to the end of the system message using the additional_context parameter. Here, additional_context adds a note to the system message indicating that the team can access specific database tables.

from textwrap import dedent

from agno.agent import Agent
from agno.team import Team
from agno.models.langdb import LangDB
from agno.tools.duckdb import DuckDbTools

duckdb_tools = DuckDbTools(
    create_tables=False, export_tables=False, summarize_tables=False
)
duckdb_tools.create_table_from_path(
    path="https://phidata-public.s3.amazonaws.com/demo_data/IMDB-Movie-Data.csv",
    table="movies",
)

web_researcher = Agent(
    name="Web Researcher",
    role="You are a web researcher that can find information on the web.",
    tools=[DuckDbTools()],
    instructions=[
        "Use your web search tool to find information on the web.",
        "Provide a summary of the information found.",
    ],
)

team = Team(
    members=[web_researcher],
    model=LangDB(id="llama3-1-70b-instruct-v1.0"),
    tools=[duckdb_tools],
    markdown=True,
    additional_context=dedent("""\
    You have access to the following tables:
    - movies: contains information about movies from IMDB.
    """),
)
team.print_response("What is the average rating of movies?", stream=True)

Team Member Information

The member information is automatically injected into the system message. This includes the member ID, name, role, and tools. You can optionally minimize this by setting add_member_tools_to_context to False, which removes the member tools from the system message. You can also give the team leader a tool to get information about the team members.

from agno.agent import Agent
from agno.team import Team

web_agent = Agent(
    name="Web Researcher",
    role="You are a web researcher that can find information on the web."
)

team = Team(
    members=[web_agent],
    get_member_information_tool=True,  # Adds a tool to get information about team members
    add_member_tools_to_context=False, # Removes the member tools from the system message
)

All interactions with team members are automatically recorded. This includes the member name, the task that was given to the member, and the response from the member. You can pass this interaction history along with future requests to a member by setting share_member_interactions=True.

team = Team(
    members=[...],
    share_member_interactions=True,
)

This appends interaction details to the task sent to a team member, for example:

<member interactions>
- Member: Web Researcher
- Task: Find information about the web
- Response: I found information about the web

- Member: HackerNews Researcher
- Task: Find information about the web
- Response: I found information about the web
</member interactions>

Tool Instructions

If you are using a Toolkit on your team, you can add tool instructions to the system message using the instructions parameter:

from agno.agent import Agent
from agno.tools.slack import SlackTools

slack_tools = SlackTools(
    instructions=["Use `send_message` to send a message to the user.  If the user specifies a thread, use `send_message_thread` to send a message to the thread."],
    add_instructions=True,
)
team = Team(
    members=[...],
    tools=[slack_tools],
)

These instructions are injected into the system message after the <additional_information> tags.

Agentic Memories

If you have enable_agentic_memory set to True on your team, the team gets the ability to create/update user memories using tools. This adds the following to the system message:

<updating_user_memories>
- You have access to the `update_user_memory` tool that you can use to add new memories, update existing memories, delete memories, or clear all memories.
- If the user's message includes information that should be captured as a memory, use the `update_user_memory` tool to update your memory database.
- Memories should include details that could personalize ongoing interactions with the user.
- Use this tool to add new memories or update existing memories that you identify in the conversation.
- Use this tool if the user asks to update their memory, delete a memory, or clear all memories.
- If you use the `update_user_memory` tool, remember to pass on the response to the user.
</updating_user_memories>

Agentic Knowledge Filters

If you have knowledge enabled on your team, you can let the team choose the knowledge filters using the enable_agentic_knowledge_filters parameter. This will add the following to the system message:

The knowledge base contains documents with these metadata filters: [filter1, filter2, filter3].
Always use filters when the user query indicates specific metadata.

Examples:
1. If the user asks about a specific person like "Jordan Mitchell", you MUST use the search_knowledge_base tool with the filters parameter set to {{'<valid key like user_id>': '<valid value based on the user query>'}}.
2. If the user asks about a specific document type like "contracts", you MUST use the search_knowledge_base tool with the filters parameter set to {{'document_type': 'contract'}}.
4. If the user asks about a specific location like "documents from New York", you MUST use the search_knowledge_base tool with the filters parameter set to {{'<valid key like location>': 'New York'}}.

General Guidelines:
- Always analyze the user query to identify relevant metadata.
- Use the most specific filter(s) possible to narrow down results.
- If multiple filters are relevant, combine them in the filters parameter (e.g., {{'name': 'Jordan Mitchell', 'document_type': 'contract'}}).
- Ensure the filter keys match the valid metadata filters: [filter1, filter2, filter3].

You can use the search_knowledge_base tool to search the knowledge base and get the most relevant documents. Make sure to pass the filters as [Dict[str: Any]] to the tool. FOLLOW THIS STRUCTURE STRICTLY.

Learn about agentic knowledge filters in more detail in the knowledge filters section.

Set the system message directly

You can manually set the system message using the system_message parameter. This will ignore all other settings and use the system message you provide.

from agno.team import Team

team = Team(members=[], system_message="Share a 2 sentence story about")
team.print_response("Love in the year 12000.")

User message context

The input sent to the Team.run() or Team.print_response() is used as the user message. See dependencies for how to do dependency injection for your user message.

Additional user message context

By default, the user message is built using the input sent to the Team.run() or Team.print_response() functions. The following team parameters configure how the user message is built:

add_knowledge_to_context
add_dependencies_to_context

from agno.agent import Agent
from agno.team import Team

web_agent = Agent(
    name="Web Researcher",
    role="You are a web researcher that can find information on the web."
)

team = Team(
    members=[web_agent],
    add_knowledge_to_context=True, 
    add_dependencies_to_context=True
)
team.print_response("What is the capital of France?", dependencies={"name": "John Doe"})

The user message that is sent to the model will look like this:

What is the capital of France?

Use the following references from the knowledge base if it helps:
<references>
- Reference 1
- Reference 2
</references>

<additional context>
{"name": "John Doe"}
</additional context>

Chat history

If you have database storage enabled on your team, session history is automatically stored (see sessions). You can now add the history of the conversation to the context using add_history_to_context.

from agno.agent import Agent
from agno.team import Team
from agno.tools.duckduckgo import DuckDuckGoTools
from agno.db.postgres import PostgresDb
from agno.models.openai import OpenAIChat

db_url = "postgresql+psycopg://ai:ai@localhost:5532/ai"

db = PostgresDb(db_url=db_url)

web_researcher = Agent(
    name="Web Researcher",
    role="You are a web researcher that can find information on the web.",
    tools=[DuckDuckGoTools()],
    instructions=[
        "Use your web search tool to find information on the web.",
        "Provide a summary of the information found.",
    ],
)

team = Team(
    members=[web_researcher],
    model=OpenAIChat(id="gpt-5-mini"),
    db=db,
    session_id="chat_history",
    instructions="You are a helpful assistant that can answer questions about space and oceans.",
    add_history_to_context=True,
    num_history_runs=2,  # Optionally limit the number of history responses to add to the context
)

team.print_response("Where is the sea of tranquility?")

team.print_response("What was my first question?")

This will add the history of the conversation to the context, which can be used to provide context for the next message. See more details on sessions.

All team member runs are added to the team session history.

Additional input

You can add entire additional messages to your team’s context using the additional_input parameter. These messages are added to the context as if they were part of the conversation history. You can give your team examples of how it should respond (also called “few-shot prompting”):

from agno.team import Team
from agno.models.message import Message
from agno.models.openai.chat import OpenAIChat

# Few-shot examples showing good support patterns
support_examples = [
    # Example 1: Simple issue resolution
    Message(role="user", content="I forgot my password and can't log in"),
    Message(
        role="assistant",
        content="""
    I'll help you reset your password right away.

    **Steps to Reset Your Password:**
    . Go to the login page and click "Forgot Password"
    . Enter your email address
    . Check your email for the reset link
    . Follow the link to create a new password
    . Use a strong password with uppercase, lowercase, numbers, and symbols

    f you don't receive the email within 5 minutes, please check your spam folder. Let me know if you need any assistance with these steps!
    """.strip(),
    ),
    # Example 2: Billing issue pattern
    Message(
        role="user",
        content="I've been charged twice for the same order and I'm frustrated!",
    ),
    Message(
        role="assistant",
        content="""
    I sincerely apologize for the billing error and the frustration this has caused you.

    **Immediate Action Plan:**
    1. I'll investigate your account to confirm the duplicate charge
    2. Process a full refund for the duplicate transaction
    3. Ensure this doesn't happen again by checking your payment method settings
    4. Provide you with a confirmation number once the refund is processed

    The refund typically takes 3-5 business days to appear on your statement. As an apology for this inconvenience, I'd also like to offer you a 10% discount on your next order.

    Is there anything else I can help you with regarding this issue?
    """.strip(),
    ),
    # Example 3: Technical support pattern
    Message(role="user", content="Your app keeps crashing when I try to upload photos"),
    Message(
        role="assistant",
        content="""
    I'm sorry you're experiencing crashes with photo uploads. Let me help you troubleshoot this issue.

    **Troubleshooting Steps:**
    1. **Check App Version:** Ensure you have the latest version from the app store
    2. **Restart the App:** Close completely and reopen the application
    3. **Check Storage:** Make sure you have sufficient device storage (at least 1GB free)
    4. **Photo Size:** Try uploading smaller photos (under 10MB each)
    5. **Network Connection:** Ensure you have a stable internet connection

    **If the issue persists:**
    - Try uploading one photo at a time instead of multiple
    - Clear the app cache in your device settings
    - Restart your device

    If none of these steps resolve the issue, please let me know your device type and OS version, and I'll escalate this to our technical team for further investigation.
    """.strip(),
    ),
]

if __name__ == "__main__":
    # Create agent with few-shot learning
    team = Team(
        members=[...],
        name="Customer Support Team",
        model=OpenAIChat(id="gpt-5-mini"),
        add_name_to_context=True,
        additional_input=support_examples,  # few-shot learning examples
        instructions=[
            "You are an expert customer support specialist.",
            "Always be empathetic, professional, and solution-oriented.",
            "Provide clear, actionable steps to resolve customer issues.",
            "Follow the established patterns for consistent, high-quality support.",
        ],
        markdown=True,
    )

    for i, example in enumerate(support_examples, 1):
        print(f"📞 Example {i}: {example}")
        print("-" * 50)
        team.print_response(example)

Context Caching

Most model providers support caching of system and user messages, though the implementation differs between providers. The general approach is to cache repetitive content and common instructions, and then reuse that cached content in subsequent requests as the prefix of your system message. In other words, if the model supports caching, you can reduce the number of tokens sent by placing static content at the start of the system message. Agno’s context construction is designed to place the most likely static content at the beginning of the system message. If you want more control, you can fine-tune this by manually setting the system message. For teams, member information, delegation instructions, and coordination guidelines are usually static and therefore strong candidates for caching. Some examples of prompt caching:

OpenAI’s prompt caching
Anthropic prompt caching -> See an Agno example of this
OpenRouter prompt caching

Developer Resources

View the Team schema
View Cookbook

Introduction

Learn

Help

Context Engineering

System message context

System message Parameters

How the system message is built

Additional Context

Team Member Information

Tool Instructions

Agentic Memories

Agentic Knowledge Filters

Set the system message directly

User message context

Additional user message context

Chat history

Additional input

Context Caching

Developer Resources

Introduction

Learn

Help

​System message context

​System message Parameters

​How the system message is built

​Additional Context

​Team Member Information

​Share member interactions

​Tool Instructions

​Agentic Memories

​Agentic Knowledge Filters

​Set the system message directly

​User message context

​Additional user message context

​Chat history

​Additional input

​Context Caching

​Developer Resources

System message context

System message Parameters

How the system message is built

Additional Context

Team Member Information

Share member interactions

Tool Instructions

Agentic Memories

Agentic Knowledge Filters

Set the system message directly

User message context

Additional user message context

Chat history

Additional input

Context Caching

Developer Resources