What Is an Agent Manifest?
An agent manifest is a machine-readable document an organisation serves to declare its agent-facing surface: who it is, what capabilities it exposes, how to reach them, and often who is accountable. Served at a well-known path, it is the file an agent reads first. A manifest declares meaning and capability; it is the discovery half of the agentic internet, distinct from the authority and record that let an agent actually act.
If you serve it, declare it
A manifest is only true if it matches what the organisation actually serves and does. Over-declaring fails the first fetch; serving a capability without declaring it fails silently, because nobody calls what they were never told about. A manifest kept honest against the real surface is the difference between a door and a sign pointing at a wall.
Related standards
Questions
Is an agent manifest the same as agents.txt?
agents.txt is one manifest-like convention focused on discovery. A manifest is the general idea; the estate’s charter and handshake serve the identity and capability layer agents.txt leaves out.
Where is the manifest served?
At a well-known path on the organisation’s own domain, so an agent can find it by convention rather than configuration.
Terms on this page, defined by their owners
Where this lives in the estate
FlashyOS — the charter and handshake served at well-known paths
Keep reading
By Michael Gord · published 2026-10-04 · part of the Agentic Encyclopedia. Dates are the day of publication; events are cited at their own dates.