---
title: "Instructions"
description: "Apply your team’s coding conventions and project guidance across agent runs."
canonical_url: "https://hoplite.sh/docs/agent/instructions"
markdown_url: "https://hoplite.sh/docs/agent/instructions.md"
---

# Instructions
URL: /docs/agent/instructions
LLM index: /llms.txt
Description: Apply your team’s coding conventions and project guidance across agent runs.
Related: /docs/agent/skills, /docs/agent, /docs/workspace/project-settings

# Instructions

Give every run in a project the same baseline guidance with project instructions. Set them under **Settings → Project → Agents**; Hoplite includes them alongside the selected model and the context assembled for the thread.

## Repository instructions

Hoplite loads root `AGENTS.md` before the first model call, with `CLAUDE.md` as a fallback. Nested instruction files are read as the agent works in their directories. Commit these files with the repository so the instructions follow the checked-out revision.

## Scope

Project instructions apply across the project's threads. A message sent in one thread applies to that thread; it does not update project instructions. Personal output preferences and memories have their own [per-user scope](/docs/agent#personal-memories).

Repository skills are discovered from the checked-out repository and read on demand. Hosted personal skills come from the initiating user's library. See [Skills](/docs/agent/skills) for precedence and import limits.

## Execution settings

Changing instructions does not change the commands Hoplite runs during workspace setup. Configure executable setup and preview commands in [project scripts](/docs/sandboxes/scripts). The agent can inspect their effective values and update project overrides directly.

## Sitemap

Sitemap discovery is not enabled for this deployment.