Agent Skills
Agent skills are markdown instruction files (SKILL.md) that teach AI coding agents best practices for using Basic Memory's MCP tools. Your agent already has access to the tools — skills teach it when and how to use them effectively, with examples and patterns for specific workflows.
The skills are open source — browse the full collection on GitHub.
Installation
npx (Recommended)
Install all skills at once:
npx skills add basicmachines-co/basic-memory-skills
Or install a single skill:
npx skills add basicmachines-co/basic-memory-skills --skill memory-tasks
Target a specific agent:
npx skills add basicmachines-co/basic-memory-skills --agent claude
Claude Desktop
- Open Settings → Capabilities
- Enable Code execution and Skills
- Upload the
SKILL.mdfiles from each skill folder
Manual
Clone the repo and copy skill folders to your agent's skills directory:
git clone https://github.com/basicmachines-co/basic-memory-skills.git
cp -r basic-memory-skills/memory-notes ~/.claude/skills/
For project-scoped skills, copy to .claude/skills/ in your project root instead.
Available Skills
| Skill | Purpose |
|---|---|
| memory-notes | Core note format — frontmatter, observations, relations, memory:// URLs |
| memory-tasks | Structured task tracking that survives context compaction |
| memory-schema | Schema lifecycle — infer, validate, create definitions, detect drift |
| memory-reflect | Review conversations, extract insights, consolidate knowledge |
| memory-defrag | Split bloated files, merge duplicates, restructure hierarchy |
| memory-lifecycle | Status transitions through folder-based organization, archive-never-delete |
| memory-metadata-search | Query notes by custom frontmatter fields (equality, range, array filters) |
| memory-ingest | Process transcripts, emails, and documents into structured notes |
| memory-research | Web research synthesized into knowledge entities |
Core Skills
memory-notes — The foundation. Teaches proper note structure: frontmatter, semantic observation categories, relations with wiki-links, and memory:// URL usage. Install this first.
memory-tasks — Structured task tracking with typed Task notes. Tasks survive context compaction, making this essential for multi-step work that spans beyond a single context window.
memory-schema — Schema lifecycle management. Discovers unschemaed notes, infers schemas from existing content, creates and edits definitions, validates notes against schemas, and detects drift.
Knowledge Maintenance
memory-reflect — Inspired by sleep-time compute patterns. Reviews recent conversations, extracts insights, and consolidates them into your knowledge base. Works well as a scheduled daily or twice-daily routine.
memory-defrag — Memory defragmentation. Splits bloated files, merges duplicates, removes stale information, and restructures folder hierarchy. Run weekly or when your knowledge base feels disorganized.
memory-lifecycle — Entity lifecycle management. Manages status transitions through folder-based organization with an archive-never-delete philosophy — information is preserved through moves, not removal.
Advanced Workflows
memory-metadata-search — Structured metadata search. Query notes by custom frontmatter fields using equality, range, array, and nested filters. Useful for finding notes by status, priority, or any custom YAML fields.
memory-ingest — Processes unstructured external input into structured entities. Parses meeting transcripts, conversation logs, and pasted documents into properly formatted Basic Memory notes.
memory-research — Performs web research and synthesizes findings into Basic Memory entities. Use for researching companies, people, technologies, or any topic you want to capture in your knowledge base.
Recommended Combinations
Developers — memory-notes + memory-tasks + memory-schema
Core note writing, task tracking across sessions, and schema consistency for project documentation.
Researchers — memory-notes + memory-research + memory-ingest
Capture web research and process external documents into structured knowledge.
Knowledge Maintenance — memory-notes + memory-defrag + memory-lifecycle + memory-reflect
Keep your knowledge base organized with regular reflection, defragmentation, and lifecycle management.
Everything — Install all 9 skills for comprehensive memory management across ingestion, organization, reflection, and lifecycle.
npx skills add basicmachines-co/basic-memory-skills