Compass Docs
Agents

Giving agents tools

Let an agent act — call integrations, run workflows, and hand off to other agents.

A tool is a capability you grant an agent so it can do things, not just respond. With tools, an agent can query a database, call an API, run a whole workflow, or hand part of the job to another agent. The agent decides when to use each tool while it works; you decide which tools it's allowed to use.

The three kinds of tool

Adding a tool

In the builder's Tools panel, click Add tool. A picker opens listing everything available in the project, grouped by kind:

Choose what to add

Search and pick an integration, a workflow, or another agent.

For an integration, choose its actions

Select which of the integration's actions the agent may call. You can grant one, a few, or all of them.

Make sure it has a connection

An integration tool needs a connection to run through. If one isn't set, the picker flags it — pick a connection to resolve the warning.

The agent's Tools panel then lists what it can use. Remove a tool any time to take the capability away.

Tools that are other agents or workflows

When you add a workflow or another agent as a tool, the agent can invoke it by name, pass it input, and use what it returns — all within a single run. This is how you compose bigger behavior out of smaller, focused pieces.

Tools must be deployed

A workflow or agent has to be deployed before another agent can use it as a tool. Drafts aren't callable — deploy the piece you want to reuse first, then add it as a tool.

How tools show up in a run

Every tool call the agent makes is recorded in the run's trace: which tool, the inputs it was called with, and what it returned. When a tool is itself a workflow or agent, you can expand its trace to see that sub-run's own steps inline. This makes it easy to follow exactly how the agent reached its result.

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