This video demos VS Code’s new Chat Customizations feature as a centralized home for AI agent development, bringing together agents, skills, instructions, prompts, hooks, MCP servers, and plugins. It shows how customizations previously scattered across folders and settings can now be managed from the chat gear icon, including viewing workspace, extension, and built-in contributions, plus options for local, Copilot CLI, and Claude. The walkthrough includes generating a new agent via built-in prompts, managing skills and instructions, using the built-in /init command to create or update workspace instructions as a project evolves, and creating hooks tied to lifecycle events. It also highlights browsing and managing MCP servers and plugins via marketplace/registries, enabling or disabling them per workspace.

Kayla's Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3Y6oPWcWo0&pp=0gcJCdkKAYcqIYzv
Chat Customizations: https://code.visualstudio.com/updates/v1_113#_chat-customizations-editor-preview

00:00 Chat Customizations Intro
00:55 Where Settings Lived Before
01:23 Unified Customizations Panel
02:27 Agents Overview
03:07 Create A New Agent
04:59 Skills And Extensions
05:33 Instructions And Prompts
06:28 Init Prompt Updates
08:51 Hooks Automation
10:03 MCP Servers Marketplace
11:12 Plugins Bundles
12:43 Wrap Up And Next Steps

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We Are .NET

VS Code's new Chat Customizations panel consolidates all AI development configurations into a single unified interface. It brings together custom agents, skills, instructions, prompts, hooks, MCP servers, and plugins in one place, covering both local and Copilot CLI/Claude Code contexts. The panel lets you view, create, and manage all customizations with AI-assisted generation via built-in slash commands like /init (auto-generates or updates workspace instructions) and /create (builds new agents). MCP servers can be browsed from a marketplace and toggled per workspace. Plugins bundle multiple customization types together and can be sourced from multiple marketplaces. The /init command is highlighted as a starting point for any project to auto-configure AI coding instructions.

VS Code Chat Customizations: Agents, Skills, Prompts, Hooks, MCP Servers & Plugins in One Place