The landscape of AI-powered development environments is shifting rapidly, and Google’s latest update to Antigravity brings a game-changing feature to the table: Agent Skills. This new capability, along with significant performance boosts and security enhancements, promises to redefine how developers interact with their AI pair programmers.
In this deep dive, we’ll explore what Agent Skills are, how to use them, and what other major updates—like Gemini 3 Flash and Secure Mode—mean for your workflow.
What Are Agent Skills?
At its core, an Agent Skill is a reusable package of instructions that teaches your AI agent how to perform specific tasks. Think of it as a custom plugin or a "playbook" that you define once and your agent can recall whenever needed.
Technically, a skill is simply a directory containing a
SKILL.md file. This file uses YAML frontmatter (defining the skill's name and description) followed by natural language instructions, code snippets, or step-by-step guides.When you’re in a conversation with Antigravity, the system automatically detects these skills. If your request matches a skill's description, the agent essentially "downloads" that knowledge and executes the task according to your custom playbook.
How to Create Your First Skill
Creating a skill is straightforward:
- Create a Directory: Navigate to you project's
.agent/skills/folder (for project-specific skills) or~/.gemini/antigravity/skills/(for global skills). Create a new folder, e.g.,feature-scaffold. - Add SKILL.md: Inside that folder, create a file named
SKILL.md. - Define Metadata & Instructions:
markdown
---
name: feature-scaffold
description: Generates a boilerplate structure for a new feature component.
---
# Feature Scaffold Skill
When the user asks to "scaffold a new feature":
1. Ask for the feature name.
2. Create a directory with that name.
3. specific files: index.ts, style.css, and component.tsx.
...
Once saved, just refresh your Antigravity chat. The agent will now recognize "feature scaffold" as a discrete capability!
Want to create custom agent skills? Use our Antigravity Agent Skill Builder to generate standardSKILL.mdfiles instantly.
Agent Manager: Your Mission Control
Antigravity isn't just a chat window; it's a full-featured environment. The IDE introduces a split interface:
- The Editor: Your standard coding workspace.
- The Agent Manager: A dedicated dashboard to spawn and oversee multiple AI agents working in parallel.
This "Mission Control" allows you to assign high-level tasks (e.g., "Refactor authentication", "Write unit tests") to separate agents. You can watch them execute complex workflows simultaneously, greatly accelerating your development velocity.
Global vs. Workspace Skills
Antigravity offers two scopes for your agent skills, giving you granular control over your AI's behavior:
- Workspace Skills (
.agent/skills/): Specific to your current project. Use these for repo-specific conventions, architecture rules, or project-only scripts. - Global Skills (
~/.gemini/antigravity/skills/): Available across all your projects. Perfect for your personal coding style, favorite testing patterns, or universal workflows.
Pro Tip: Start by creating a skill in your workspace. Once you've refined it, move it to your global folder to take that superpower with you everywhere.
Need for Speed: Gemini 3 Flash
Speed is critical in a flow state. Google DeepMind has integrated Gemini 3 Flash, a model optimized explicitly for low-latency interactions.
Announced in December 2025, Gemini 3 Flash is reported to be 3x faster than the previous Gemini 2.5 Pro model while maintaining high reasoning capabilities. For developers, this means near-instant code generation and faster answers to complex queries, making the "pair programming" experience feel much more conversational and less like waiting in a queue.
Enhanced Safety: Secure Mode
With great power comes the need for control. The update introduces Secure Mode, a setting designed to "provide enhanced security controls for the Agent."
When enabled, Secure Mode restricts the agent's ability to:
- Access external resources (like the open web).
- Execute arbitrary shell commands without approval.
- Perform sensitive file system operations.
This is particularly useful when working in enterprise environments or on confidential projects where you want to ensure the AI doesn't accidentally leak data or run unchecked scripts. It puts the human firmly in the loop for every critical action.
Infinite Possibilities with AI Ultra
For power users, Google has clarified the benefits of the AI Ultra subscription tiers. Users on Google AI Ultra or Workspace AI Ultra receive significantly higher rate limits.
Unlike standard tiers that might have weekly caps, AI Ultra offers a "generous quota, refreshed every five hours," effectively removing the friction of usage limits for full-time developers. This ensures that your AI assistant is available whenever you are, tackling intensive refactoring or documentation tasks without hitting a wall.
Plan Comparison: Quotas & Refresh Rates
| Feature | Free Tier (Public Preview) | AI Ultra (Workspace) |
|---|---|---|
| Model Access | Gemini 3 Flash / 2.5 Pro | Gemini 3 Flash, 3 Pro (Full Context) |
| Quota Refresh | Weekly limits | Every 5 hours |
| Rate Limit | Standard | High / Effectively Unlimited |
| Ideal For | Individual Developers | Enterprise Teams & Power Users |
Battle of the Agents: Antigravity vs. The Rest
How does Google's offering stack up against the current market leaders? We compared Antigravity with Cursor, Windsurf, and GitHub Copilot to see where the new "Agent Skills" update places it.
| Feature | Google Antigravity | Cursor | Windsurf | GitHub Copilot |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Core Strength | Agentic Skills & Deep Integration | Predictive Edits (Tab-to-complete) | "Flow" State (Cascade) | Enterprise Ecosystem |
| Agentic Capability | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (Autonomous Planning) | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (Composer) | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (Cascade) | ⭐⭐⭐ (Chat/Agent Mode) |
| Primary Models | Gemini 3 Flash / Pro | Claude 3.5 Sonnet / GPT-4o | GPT-4o / Claude 3.5 Sonnet | GPT-4o / Claude 3.5 Sonnet |
| Context Window | Full Workspace (Deep Context) | 200k Tokens | ~150k Tokens | 128k Tokens (varies) |
| Pricing | Free (Public Preview) | $20/month (Pro) | $15/month (Pro) | $10/month (Individual) |
The Verdict: While Cursor and Windsurf are phenomenal tools for code completion and inline editing, Antigravity takes the lead in autonomous task execution. The combination of Agent Skills and a Free tier (during preview) makes it the most accessible and customizable agentic IDE for 2026.
Conclusion
The latest Antigravity update is more than just a model bump; it's a structural evolution. Agent Skills turn the IDE into a customizable platform where you can script your own AI workflows. Combined with the blazing speed of Gemini 3 Flash and the safety of Secure Mode, Google Antigravity is shaping up to be an indispensable tool for the modern developer.