Claude API

Building LLM-Powered Applications with Claude

This skill helps you build LLM-powered applications with Claude. Choose the right surface based on your needs, detect the project language, then read the relevant language-specific documentation.

Before You Start

Scan the target file (or, if no target file, the prompt and project) for non-Anthropic provider markers — import openai, from openai, langchain_openai, OpenAI(, gpt-4, gpt-5, file names like agent-openai.py or *-generic.py, or any explicit instruction to keep the code provider-neutral. If you find any, stop and tell the user that this skill produces Claude/Anthropic SDK code; ask whether they want to switch the file to Claude or want a non-Claude implementation. Do not edit a non-Anthropic file with Anthropic SDK calls.

Output Requirement

When the user asks you to add, modify, or implement a Claude feature, your code must call Claude through one of:

1. The official Anthropic SDK for the project's language (anthropic, @anthropic-ai/sdk, com.anthropic.*, etc.). This is the default whenever a supported SDK exists for the project.
2. Raw HTTP (curl, requests, fetch, httpx, etc.) — only when the user explicitly asks for cURL/REST/raw HTTP, the project is a shell/cURL project, or the language has no official SDK.

Never mix the two — don't reach for requests/fetch in a Python or TypeScript project just because it feels lighter. Never fall back to OpenAI-compatible shims.

Never guess SDK usage. Function names, class names, namespaces, method signatures, and import paths must come from explicit documentation — either the {lang}/ files in this skill or the official SDK repositories or documentation links listed in shared/live-sources.md. If the binding you need is not explicitly documented in the skill files, WebFetch the relevant SDK repo from shared/live-sources.md before writing code. Do not infer Ruby/Java/Go/PHP/C# APIs from cURL shapes or from another language's SDK.

If WebFetch or repository access fails (network restricted, timeouts, clone blocked): do not keep retrying — write code from the patterns and namespace/package tables in the {lang}/ file, run the compiler or interpreter on it, and iterate on the error output. For statically-typed SDKs (C#, Java, Go) a compile-fix loop against local errors reaches working code faster than blocked network research.

Defaults

Unless the user requests otherwise:

For the Claude model version, please use Claude Opus 4.8, which you can access via the exact model string claude-opus-4-8. Please default to using adaptive thinking (thinking: {type: "adaptive"}) for anything remotely complicated. And finally, please default to streaming for any request that may involve long input, long output, or high max_tokens — it prevents hitting request timeouts. Use the SDK's .get_final_message() / .finalMessage() helper to get the complete response if you don't need to handle individual stream events

⚠️ API Drift — Your Training Prior May Be Stale

Several common Claude API shapes changed in 2025–2026. If you recall a pattern from training, verify it against the {lang}/ files in this skill before writing — the rows below are the most frequent drift points:

The {lang}/ files in this skill are authoritative over recalled patterns.

Subcommands

If the User Request at the bottom of this prompt is a bare subcommand string (no prose), search every Subcommands table in this document — including any in sections appended below — and follow the matching Action column directly. This lets users invoke specific flows via /claude-api <subcommand>. If no table in the document matches, treat the request as normal prose.

Language Detection

Before reading code examples, determine which language the user is working in:

1. Look at project files to infer the language:

   • *.py, requirements.txt, pyproject.toml, setup.py, Pipfile → Python — read from python/
   • *.ts, *.tsx, package.json, tsconfig.json → TypeScript — read from typescript/
   • *.js, *.jsx (no .ts files present) → TypeScript — JS uses the same SDK, read from typescript/
   • *.java, pom.xml, build.gradle → Java — read from java/
   • *.kt, *.kts, build.gradle.kts → Java — Kotlin uses the Java SDK, read from java/
   • *.scala, build.sbt → Java — Scala uses the Java SDK, read from java/
   • *.go, go.mod → Go — read from go/
   • *.rb, Gemfile → Ruby — read from ruby/
   • *.cs, *.csproj → C# — read from csharp/
   • *.php, composer.json → PHP — read from php/

2. If multiple languages detected (e.g., both Python and TypeScript files):

   • Check which language the user's current file or question relates to
   • If still ambiguous, ask: "I detected both Python and TypeScript files. Which language are you using for the Claude API integration?"

3. If language can't be inferred (empty project, no source files, or unsupported language):

   • Use AskUserQuestion with options: Python, TypeScript, Java, Go, Ruby, cURL/raw HTTP, C#, PHP
   • If AskUserQuestion is unavailable, default to Python examples and note: "Showing Python examples. Let me know if you need a different language."

4. If unsupported language detected (Rust, Swift, C++, Elixir, etc.):

   • Suggest cURL/raw HTTP examples from curl/ and note that community SDKs may exist
   • Offer to show Python or TypeScript examples as reference implementations

5. If user needs cURL/raw HTTP examples, read from curl/.

Language-Specific Feature Support

Managed Agents code examples: dedicated language-specific READMEs are provided for Python, TypeScript, Go, Ruby, PHP, Java, and cURL ({lang}/managed-agents/README.md, curl/managed-agents.md). Read your language's README plus the language-agnostic shared/managed-agents-*.md concept files. Agents are persistent — create once, reference by ID. Store the agent ID returned by agents.create and pass it to every subsequent sessions.create; do not call agents.create in the request path. The Anthropic CLI (ant) is one convenient way to create agents and environments from version-controlled YAML — see shared/anthropic-cli.md. If a binding you need isn't shown in the README, WebFetch the relevant entry from shared/live-sources.md rather than guess. C# has beta Managed Agents support via client.Beta.Agents and related namespaces.

Which Surface Should I Use?

Start simple. Default to the simplest tier that meets your needs. Single API calls and workflows handle most use cases — only reach for agents when the task genuinely requires open-ended, model-driven exploration.

Note: Managed Agents is the right choice when you want Anthropic to run the agent loop and host the container where tools execute — file ops, bash, code execution all run in the per-session workspace. If you want to host the compute yourself or run your own custom tool runtime, Claude API + tool use is the right choice — use the tool runner for automatic loop handling, or the manual loop for fine-grained control (approval gates, custom logging, conditional execution).

Cloud-provider access. Claude Platform on AWS is Anthropic-operated with same-day API parity — see shared/claude-platform-on-aws.md for client setup. For per-feature availability on Claude Platform on AWS, Amazon Bedrock, Google Vertex AI, and Microsoft Foundry, see shared/platform-availability.md — that table is the single source of truth in this skill; do not infer availability from anywhere else.

Decision Tree

What does your application need?

0. Which provider?
   ├── First-party API or Claude Platform on AWS → continue (full surface available; per-feature exceptions in shared/platform-availability.md).
   └── Amazon Bedrock, Google Vertex AI, or Microsoft Foundry → Claude API (+ tool use for agents); see shared/platform-availability.md for per-feature support.

1. Single LLM call (classification, summarization, extraction, Q&A)
   └── Claude API — one request, one response

2. Do you want Anthropic to run the agent loop and host a per-session
   container where Claude executes tools (bash, file ops, code)?
   └── Yes → Managed Agents — server-managed sessions, persisted agent configs,
       SSE event stream, Skills + MCP, file mounts.
       Examples: "stateful coding agent with a workspace per task",
                 "long-running research agent that streams events to a UI",
                 "agent with persisted, versioned config used across many sessions"

3. Workflow (multi-step, code-orchestrated, with your own tools)
   └── Claude API with tool use — you control the loop

4. Open-ended agent (model decides its own trajectory, your own tools, you host the compute)
   └── Claude API agentic loop (maximum flexibility)

Should I Build an Agent?

Before choosing the agent tier, check all four criteria:

• Complexity — Is the task multi-step and hard to fully specify in advance? (e.g., "turn this design doc into a PR" vs. "extract the title from this PDF")
• Value — Does the outcome justify higher cost and latency?
• Viability — Is Claude capable at this task type?
• Cost of error — Can errors be caught and recovered from? (tests, review, rollback)

If the answer is "no" to any of these, stay at a simpler tier (single call or workflow).

Architecture

Everything goes through POST /v1/messages. Tools and output constraints are features of this single endpoint — not separate APIs.

User-defined tools — You define tools (via decorators, Zod schemas, or raw JSON), and the SDK's tool runner handles calling the API, executing your functions, and looping until Claude is done. For full control, you can write the loop manually.

Server-side tools — Anthropic-hosted tools that run on Anthropic's infrastructure. Code execution is fully server-side (declare it in tools, Claude runs code automatically). Computer use can be server-hosted or self-hosted.

Structured outputs — Constrains the Messages API response format (output_config.format) and/or tool parameter validation (strict: true). The recommended approach is client.messages.parse() which validates responses against your schema automatically. Note: the old output_format parameter is deprecated; use output_config: {format: {...}} on messages.create().

Supporting endpoints — Batches (POST /v1/messages/batches), Files (POST /v1/files), Token Counting (POST /v1/messages/count_tokens — see shared/token-counting.md), and Models (GET /v1/models, GET /v1/models/{id} — live capability/context-window discovery) feed into or support Messages API requests.

Current Models (cached: 2026-06-04)

ALWAYS use claude-opus-4-8 unless the user explicitly names a different model. This is non-negotiable. Do not use claude-sonnet-4-6, claude-sonnet-4-5, or any other model unless the user literally says "use sonnet" or "use haiku". Never downgrade for cost — that's the user's decision, not yours. Use claude-fable-5 only when the user explicitly asks for Claude Fable 5, "fable", or Anthropic's most capable model — it has different API behavior than the Opus family (see below) and pricing that exceeds Opus-tier.

Claude Fable 5 (claude-fable-5) — most capable widely released model

Claude Fable 5 is Anthropic's most capable widely released model, for the most demanding reasoning and long-horizon agentic work. Claude Mythos 5 (claude-mythos-5) offers the same capabilities, pricing, and API surface through Project Glasswing (participation is the only way to access it), succeeding the invitation-only Claude Mythos Preview (claude-mythos-preview) — everything below applies to both models. 1M context window (the maximum is also the default), 128K max output. Key API differences from Opus-tier — see shared/model-migration.md → Migrating to Claude Fable 5 for details:

• Thinking is always on — omit the thinking parameter entirely (or send {type: "adaptive"}). Any other explicit configuration is rejected: {type: "disabled"} and {type: "enabled", budget_tokens: N} both return a 400. Control depth with output_config.effort (supports low through xhigh and max).
• The raw chain of thought is never returned — responses carry regular thinking blocks (not redacted_thinking): display: "summarized" returns a readable summary, "omitted" (the default) leaves the thinking field as an empty string. Replay rules: pass thinking blocks back exactly as received on the same model (including empty-text blocks — the API rejects modified blocks, not read ones); a different model drops them from the prompt (typically silently — not an error; the drop happens before pricing, so dropped blocks aren't billed and there's nothing to strip). Regular thinking blocks from other models replay across models freely.
• Tokenizer — same tokenizer as Opus 4.8 (introduced with Opus 4.7). Token counts are roughly unchanged when migrating from Opus 4.7/4.8; per-token pricing differs. Coming from Opus 4.6, Sonnet, Haiku, or older, re-baseline with count_tokens.
• refusal stop reason — handle it, and opt into fallbacks by default — safety classifiers may decline a request (HTTP 200, stop_reason: "refusal", with a stop_details category). A pre-output refusal has an empty content array and is not billed at all; a mid-stream refusal bills the already-streamed output — discard the partial output. Always check stop_reason before reading content. Recovery is opt-in on the API: most Claude consumer surfaces ship with built-in Claude Opus 4.8 fallbacks, but an API request that doesn't opt in simply stops on a refusal — and false positives on benign adjacent work (security tooling, life-sciences tasks) do happen. When you write claude-fable-5 code, include the server-side fallbacks parameter by default (betas: ["server-side-fallback-2026-06-01"] + fallbacks: [{"model": "claude-opus-4-8"}]; Claude API and Claude Platform on AWS): a declined request is transparently re-served by the fallback model inside the same call, with credit-style repricing applied automatically (a decline before any output isn't billed; the rescue bills at the fallback model's own rates). Tell the user you've enabled it; drop it only if they decline. The GA SDKs' client-side BetaRefusalFallbackMiddleware + BetaFallbackState handle retry everywhere server-side fallbacks aren't supported (incl. Amazon Bedrock, Vertex AI, Microsoft Foundry); fallback credit refunds the cache-switch cost of client-side retries. Code examples: the Refusal Fallbacks section of your language's claude-api doc; full semantics in the migration guide's refusal section.
• No assistant prefill — same as the rest of the 4.6+ family.
• 30-day data retention required — Claude Fable 5 is not available under zero data retention; requests from an org whose retention configuration doesn't meet the requirement return 400 invalid_request_error.
• Longer turns, different prompting — single requests on hard tasks can run many minutes (plan timeouts/streaming/progress UX); effort sweeps should include low/medium for routine work; prompts written for prior models are often too prescriptive and reduce output quality. See shared/model-migration.md → Migrating to Claude Fable 5 → Behavioral shifts (prompt-tunable) for the recommended prompt snippets (anti-overplanning, no-tidying, grounded progress claims, boundaries, async sub-agents, memory, send_to_user).

CRITICAL: Use only the exact model ID strings from the table above — they are complete as-is. Do not append date suffixes. For example, use claude-sonnet-4-6, never claude-sonnet-4-6-20251114 or any other date-suffixed variant you might recall from training data. If the user requests an older model not in the table (e.g., "opus 4.5", "sonnet 3.7"), read shared/models.md for the exact ID — do not construct one yourself.

A note: if any of the model strings above look unfamiliar to you, that's to be expected — that just means they were released after your training data cutoff. Rest assured they are real models; we wouldn't mess with you like that.

Live capability lookup: The table above is cached. When the user asks "what's the context window for X", "does X support vision/thinking/effort", or "which models support Y", query the Models API (client.models.retrieve(id) / client.models.list()) — see shared/models.md for the field reference and capability-filter examples.

Thinking & Effort (Quick Reference)

Fable 5 / Opus 4.8 / 4.7 — Adaptive thinking only: Use thinking: {type: "adaptive"}. thinking: {type: "enabled", budget_tokens: N} returns a 400 — adaptive is the only on-mode. On Opus 4.8 and 4.7, {type: "disabled"} and omitting thinking both work; on Fable 5, an explicit {type: "disabled"} returns a 400 — omit the thinking param entirely instead. Sampling parameters (temperature, top_p, top_k) are also removed and will 400. Opus 4.8 keeps the same request surface as 4.7 (no new breaking changes) — see shared/model-migration.md → Migrating to Opus 4.8 for the behavioral re-tuning, and → Migrating to Opus 4.7 for the full breaking-change list when coming from 4.6 or earlier. Note: with thinking disabled, Opus 4.8 may write longer reasoning into the visible response — leave adaptive thinking on, or add a final-answer-only instruction (see the migration guide). Opus 4.6 — Adaptive thinking (recommended): Use thinking: {type: "adaptive"}. Claude dynamically decides when and how much to think. No budget_tokens needed — budget_tokens is deprecated on Opus 4.6 and Sonnet 4.6 and should not be used for new code. Adaptive thinking also automatically enables interleaved thinking (no beta header needed). When the user asks for "extended thinking", a "thinking budget", or budget_tokens: always use Fable 5, Opus 4.8, 4.7, or 4.6 with thinking: {type: "adaptive"}. The concept of a fixed token budget for thinking is deprecated — adaptive thinking replaces it. Do NOT use budget_tokens for new 4.6/4.7/4.8 code and do NOT switch to an older model. Gradual-migration carve-out: budget_tokens is still functional on Opus 4.6 and Sonnet 4.6 as a transitional escape hatch — if you're migrating existing code and need a hard token ceiling before you've tuned effort, see shared/model-migration.md → Transitional escape hatch. Note: this carve-out does not apply to Fable 5, Opus 4.7 or 4.8 — budget_tokens is fully removed there. Effort parameter (GA, no beta header): Controls thinking depth and overall token spend via output_config: {effort: "low"|"medium"|"high"|"max"} (inside output_config, not top-level). Default is high (equivalent to omitting it). max is supported on Fable 5, Opus 4.6 and later, and Sonnet 4.6 (not Haiku or earlier Sonnets). Opus 4.7 added "xhigh" (between high and max) — the best setting for most coding and agentic use cases on Fable 5 / Opus 4.7/4.8, and the default in Claude Code; use a minimum of high for most intelligence-sensitive work. Works on Fable 5, Opus 4.5, Opus 4.6, Opus 4.7, Opus 4.8, and Sonnet 4.6. Will error on Sonnet 4.5 / Haiku 4.5. On Fable 5, Opus 4.7 and 4.8, effort matters more than on any prior Opus — re-tune it when migrating, and run long-horizon/agentic tasks at high/xhigh with the full task spec given up front. Combine with adaptive thinking for the best cost-quality tradeoffs. Lower effort means fewer and more-consolidated tool calls, less preamble, and terser confirmations — high is often the sweet spot balancing quality and token efficiency; use max when correctness matters more than cost; use low for subagents or simple tasks.

Thinking display — "omitted" by default on Fable 5 / Mythos 5 / Opus 4.8 / 4.7: display: "summarized" returns a readable summary of the reasoning; "omitted" (the default on all four — a silent change from Opus 4.6, where it was "summarized") streams thinking blocks with empty text. display controls visibility only — thinking happens and is billed the same under every setting; the raw chain of thought is never exposed on any model. If you stream reasoning to users, the default looks like a long pause before output — set thinking: {type: "adaptive", display: "summarized"} explicitly. (Independent of display, echo thinking blocks back unchanged when continuing on the same model; other models silently ignore them — see the migration guide.)

Task Budgets (beta, Fable 5 / Opus 4.7 / 4.8): output_config: {task_budget: {type: "tokens", total: N}} tells the model how many tokens it has for a full agentic loop — it sees a running countdown and self-moderates (minimum 20,000; beta header task-budgets-2026-03-13). Distinct from max_tokens, which is an enforced per-response ceiling the model is not aware of. See shared/model-migration.md → Task Budgets.

Sonnet 4.6: Supports adaptive thinking (thinking: {type: "adaptive"}). budget_tokens is deprecated on Sonnet 4.6 — use adaptive thinking instead.

Older models (only if explicitly requested): If the user specifically asks for Sonnet 4.5 or another older model, use thinking: {type: "enabled", budget_tokens: N}. budget_tokens must be less than max_tokens (minimum 1024). Never choose an older model just because the user mentions budget_tokens — use Opus 4.8 with adaptive thinking instead.

Compaction (Quick Reference)

Beta, Fable 5, Opus 4.8, Opus 4.7, Opus 4.6, and Sonnet 4.6. For long-running conversations that may exceed the 1M context window, enable server-side compaction. The API automatically summarizes earlier context when it approaches the trigger threshold (default: 150K tokens). Requires beta header compact-2026-01-12.

Critical: Append response.content (not just the text) back to your messages on every turn. Compaction blocks in the response must be preserved — the API uses them to replace the compacted history on the next request. Extracting only the text string and appending that will silently lose the compaction state.

See {lang}/claude-api/README.md (Compaction section) for code examples. Full docs via WebFetch in shared/live-sources.md.

Prompt Caching (Quick Reference)

Prefix match. Any byte change anywhere in the prefix invalidates everything after it. Render order is tools → system → messages. Keep stable content first (frozen system prompt, deterministic tool list), put volatile content (timestamps, per-request IDs, varying questions) after the last cache_control breakpoint.

Mid-conversation operator instructions (Claude Opus 4.8 only; no beta header): append {"role": "system", ...} to messages[] instead of editing top-level system. Preserves the cached history prefix and is the prompt-injection-safe operator channel. See shared/prompt-caching.md § Mid-conversation system messages.

Top-level auto-caching (cache_control: {type: "ephemeral"} on messages.create()) is the simplest option when you don't need fine-grained placement. Max 4 breakpoints per request. Minimum cacheable prefix is ~1024 tokens — shorter prefixes silently won't cache.

Verify with usage.cache_read_input_tokens — if it's zero across repeated requests, a silent invalidator is at work (datetime.now() in system prompt, unsorted JSON, varying tool set).

For placement patterns, architectural guidance, and the silent-invalidator audit checklist: read shared/prompt-caching.md. Language-specific syntax: {lang}/claude-api/README.md (Prompt Caching section).

Fast Mode (Quick Reference)

Research preview, Opus 4.8 / 4.7 only. Opus 4.7 fast mode is deprecated — after removal, speed: "fast" on 4.7 returns an error. Opus 4.8 is the durable fast-capable tier. Fast mode runs the same model at up to 2.5x higher output tokens per second, at premium pricing. Three things are required on every request: use the beta messages endpoint (client.beta.messages.…), pass the beta flag fast-mode-2026-02-01, and set speed: "fast" as a top-level request parameter (not a header, not in extra_body).

client.beta.messages.create(
    model="claude-opus-4-8", max_tokens=4096,
    speed="fast", betas=["fast-mode-2026-02-01"],
    messages=[...],
)

response.usage.speed reports which speed was used. Fast mode has its own rate limit separate from standard Opus; on 429, either retry after the retry-after delay or drop speed and fall back to standard (note: switching speed invalidates prompt cache). Not available with Batch API, Priority Tier, Claude Platform on AWS, or third-party platforms.

Task Budgets (Quick Reference)

Beta, Fable 5 / Opus 4.8 / 4.7. A task budget gives Claude a token ceiling for an agentic loop so it paces itself and finishes gracefully instead of being cut off. Set task_budget inside output_config on client.beta.messages.stream(...) with beta flag task-budgets-2026-03-13 — use streaming so the large max_tokens doesn't hit HTTP timeouts:

with client.beta.messages.stream(
    model="claude-opus-4-8", max_tokens=128000,
    output_config={"effort": "high", "task_budget": {"type": "tokens", "total": 64000}},
    betas=["task-budgets-2026-03-13"],
    messages=[...], tools=[...],
) as stream:
    response = stream.get_final_message()

task_budget fields: type (always "tokens"), total, and optional remaining (defaults to total). The server injects a countdown marker Claude sees during generation; the budget counts what Claude generates and the tool results it reads this turn — not the full history you resend each request.

Observing spend: accumulate response.usage.output_tokens (plus the token count of the tool-result blocks you append) across loop iterations if you want to display progress. Leave remaining unset in the normal loop — the server tracks the countdown itself, and passing a client-computed remaining while also resending full history under-reports the budget. Only pass remaining when you compact or rewrite history between requests and the server can no longer derive prior spend.

Provider Clients (Quick Reference)

When targeting Claude on a third-party platform, use that platform's dedicated client class — not the first-party Anthropic() client with a base_url override. After construction the client exposes the same messages.create / .stream surface as the first-party SDK.

Amazon Bedrock

Use the Mantle client (Messages-API Bedrock endpoint). Bedrock model IDs take an anthropic. prefix (e.g. "anthropic.claude-opus-4-8"). Region is required.

AnthropicBedrock / BedrockClient / BedrockBackend (without Mantle) are the legacy bedrock-runtime InvokeModel path — prefer the Mantle client for new code.

Microsoft Foundry

The Go and Ruby SDKs do not currently support Foundry. For Ruby, use the standard Anthropic::Client.new(base_url: "<foundry endpoint>") as a fallback (Entra ID auth is not built in). For Claude Platform on AWS, see shared/claude-platform-on-aws.md.

Google Cloud Vertex AI

Two required constructor args: GCP project_id and region. Vertex model IDs take no prefix — current-generation models (Opus 4.8/4.7/4.6, Sonnet 4.6) use the bare first-party ID (e.g. "claude-opus-4-8"); dated-snapshot models use an @ version separator (e.g. claude-opus-4-5@20251101, not claude-opus-4-5-20251101). Auth is GCP ADC (gcloud auth application-default login); no Anthropic API key. region can be "global" (recommended), a multi-region ("us"/"eu"), or a specific region. After construction, use the same messages.create / .stream surface.

Context Editing (Quick Reference)

Beta. Context editing clears old tool results or thinking blocks from the conversation before the model sees it; it is not compaction (which summarizes). On client.beta.messages.* with beta context-management-2025-06-27, pass context_management.edits with a strategy type:

client.beta.messages.create(
    model="claude-opus-4-8", max_tokens=4096,
    betas=["context-management-2025-06-27"],
    context_management={"edits": [{"type": "clear_tool_uses_20250919"}]},
    tools=[...], messages=[...],
)

Strategy types: clear_tool_uses_20250919 (clears old tool results; optional clear_tool_inputs: true also clears the tool_use params) and clear_thinking_20251015 (clears thinking blocks). Do not use compact_20260112 or beta compact-2026-01-12 — those are the separate compaction feature.

Mid-Conversation System Messages (Quick Reference)

Claude Opus 4.8 only; no beta header. Append {"role": "system", "content": "…"} to the messages array (not the top-level system field) to add an operator instruction mid-conversation without invalidating the cached prefix. Use the regular client.messages.create — there is no beta. A mid-conversation system message must follow a user message (or an assistant message ending in server-tool use), and must be either the last entry in messages or be followed by an assistant turn — it cannot be messages[0]. Availability: shared/platform-availability.md. See shared/prompt-caching.md § Mid-conversation system messages.

Managed Agents (Beta)

Managed Agents is a third surface: server-managed stateful agents with Anthropic-hosted tool execution. You create a persisted, versioned Agent config (POST /v1/agents), then start Sessions that reference it. Each session provisions a container as the agent's workspace — bash, file ops, and code execution run there; the agent loop itself runs on Anthropic's orchestration layer and acts on the container via tools. The session streams events; you send messages and tool results back.

Availability: shared/platform-availability.md. For agents on Bedrock / Vertex / Foundry (where Managed Agents is unsupported), use Claude API + tool use.

Mandatory flow: Agent (once) → Session (every run). model/system/tools live on the agent, never the session. See shared/managed-agents-overview.md for the full reading guide, beta headers, and pitfalls.

Beta headers: managed-agents-2026-04-01 — the SDK sets this automatically for all client.beta.{agents,environments,sessions,vaults,memory_stores,deployments,deployment_runs}.* calls. Skills API uses skills-2025-10-02 and Files API uses files-api-2025-04-14, but you don't need to explicitly pass those in for endpoints other than /v1/skills and /v1/files.

Subcommands — invoke directly with /claude-api <subcommand>:

Reading guide: Start with shared/managed-agents-overview.md, then the topical shared/managed-agents-*.md files (core, environments, tools, events, outcomes, multiagent, webhooks, memory, scheduled-deployments, client-patterns, onboarding, api-reference). For Python, TypeScript, Go, Ruby, PHP, and Java, read {lang}/managed-agents/README.md for code examples. For cURL, read curl/managed-agents.md. Agents are persistent — create once, reference by ID. Store the agent ID returned by agents.create and pass it to every subsequent sessions.create; do not call agents.create in the request path. The Anthropic CLI (ant) is one convenient way to create agents and environments from version-controlled YAML — see shared/anthropic-cli.md. If a binding you need isn't shown in the language README, WebFetch the relevant entry from shared/live-sources.md rather than guess. C# has beta Managed Agents support via client.Beta.Agents and related namespaces.

When the user wants to set up a Managed Agent from scratch (e.g. "how do I get started", "walk me throu

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