Worker Agent — AI Glossary

Reference details

Related terms

• AI Agent
• Subagent
• Orchestrator

Example: Why a narrow toolset is the design

A research worker gets search and read. A code worker gets the repository and a test runner. Neither can send email. Scoping tools per worker bounds what a wrong decision can do, and it also raises tool-selection accuracy — a short, relevant list is easier to choose from than a long one.

Commonly confused with

A worker is not simply a second model call. It is a scoped agent with its own prompt, tools and permissions, delegated to by an orchestrator. Calling the same model twice with different instructions is a pipeline, and the distinction matters when you are reasoning about blast radius.

When to use it

Reach for it when:

• Sub-tasks need genuinely different tools or permissions
• Work can run in parallel and be recombined
• One context window cannot hold the whole problem

Reach for something else when:

• A single agent with the same tools would do
• You cannot attribute a bad outcome to a specific worker
• Cost matters: each worker is a full model call and they multiply

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