10 Best Agent Skills for Developers [Organized by Use Case]
Agent Skills sound useful, but with so many available, you might wonder "which ones should I actually use?"
GitHub hosts countless skills with varying quality. This article curates practical skills developers can use daily, organized by use case.
All skills can be downloaded from the Skills list.
Code Review
code-reviewer
Purpose: Streamline pull request code reviews
Code review is important but time-consuming. This skill checks changes for code quality, security, and performance issues, then points out improvements.
How to use:
Review the code in this PR
Note: Treat AI reviews as input, not final judgment. Human review should make the final call.
frontend-code-review
Purpose: Frontend-specific code review
A review skill specialized for React, Vue, Angular, and other frontend code. Checks component design, performance, and accessibility.
Git & PR Creation
create-pr
Purpose: Auto-generate PR descriptions
Analyzes commit history to automatically generate PR descriptions. Structures "what changed" and "why it changed" in a way that's clear for reviewers.
How to use:
Create a PR for this branch
pr-creator
Purpose: Generate descriptions matching PR templates
Use this when you need descriptions that follow your team's PR template format. Customizable to match project conventions.
Documentation
update-docs
Purpose: Update docs when code changes
When code changes, related documentation needs updating. This skill analyzes changes, identifies docs that need updates, and proposes modifications.
Note: Fully automated doc updates are difficult, so review proposals before applying.
docstring
Purpose: Generate function and class documentation
Reads code and generates appropriate docstrings. Supports major languages including Python, JavaScript, and TypeScript.
How to use:
Add docstrings to this function
Refactoring
component-refactoring
Purpose: Split and organize components
Proposes ways to break down oversized components into appropriate granularity. Suggests structures with separation of concerns and reusability in mind.
Note: Don't apply suggestions blindly—adjust based on your project's context.
Testing
frontend-testing
Purpose: Generate frontend test code
Generates tests for components and utility functions. Supports major test frameworks including Jest, Vitest, and Testing Library.
How to use:
Write tests for this component
Skill Creation
skill-creator
Purpose: Help create new skills
Use this when building your own skills. Generates SKILL.md scaffolds and suggests best-practice structures.
skill-writer
Purpose: Improve skill descriptions
Improves your skill's description to be clearer for other developers. Useful for polishing before publishing.
Tips for Choosing Skills
Don't Judge by Stars Alone
Star count is useful, but doesn't guarantee quality. Also check:
- Last updated: Skills not updated for a while may not work with current tools
- README quality: Is usage clearly documented?
- Actual behavior: Test with small tasks first
Verify It Works in Your Environment
Agent Skills have basic cross-tool compatibility, but some features are tool-specific. Claude Code and Codex CLI may behave differently, so test in your actual environment.
Install Only What You Need
Installing too many skills makes it hard to track what's being used. Start with only what you truly need, then add gradually.
Summary
We've covered recommended Agent Skills for developers. Start by picking one skill for a task you repeat often:
- Doing lots of code reviews? → code-reviewer
- PR descriptions taking too long? → create-pr
- Forgetting to update docs? → update-docs
Browse and download all skills from the Skills list.
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