Using helderberto/agent-skills with Cursor

Cursor doesn't have a native skill system, but it loads Markdown rules from .cursor/rules/ or .cursorrules. Skills are plain Markdown, so they work as Cursor rules with minor adaptation.

Setup

Option 1: Rules directory (recommended)

# In your project root
mkdir -p .cursor/rules

# Copy the skills you want to load as rules
cp /path/to/agent-skills/skills/tdd/SKILL.md .cursor/rules/tdd.md
cp /path/to/agent-skills/skills/code-review/SKILL.md .cursor/rules/code-review.md
cp /path/to/agent-skills/skills/commit/SKILL.md .cursor/rules/commit.md

Cursor auto-loads everything in .cursor/rules/ into its context.

Option 2: Single .cursorrules file

For projects that prefer one consolidated rules file:

{
  cat /path/to/agent-skills/skills/tdd/SKILL.md
  echo "\n---\n"
  cat /path/to/agent-skills/skills/code-review/SKILL.md
} > .cursorrules

Recommended starter set

The skills below cover the most common moments where Cursor benefits from explicit guidance:

Skill	Why it helps in Cursor
tdd	Forces red-green-refactor for new features and bugs
code-review	Five-axis review framework for diffs
commit	Repository-style commit messages, conventional commits
diagnose	Disciplined debugging loop for hard bugs
source-driven	Forces use of official docs over training data
architecture-audit	Surfaces friction toward deep modules

Workflow-style skills (tracer-bullet flow)

If you want the full spec → plan → build → test loop in Cursor:

cp /path/to/agent-skills/skills/spec/SKILL.md  .cursor/rules/spec.md
cp /path/to/agent-skills/skills/plan/SKILL.md  .cursor/rules/plan.md
cp /path/to/agent-skills/skills/build/SKILL.md .cursor/rules/build.md
cp /path/to/agent-skills/skills/test/SKILL.md  .cursor/rules/test.md
cp /path/to/agent-skills/skills/brief/SKILL.md .cursor/rules/brief.md

Cursor will then route prompts like "plan the dark mode feature" or "build the next phase" through these rules automatically.

Limitations

• Cursor does not support slash-style invocation (e.g., /hb:spec). Reference skills by name in prompts: "use the spec skill to ...".
• Rules can grow Cursor's context fast. Load only the skills you actively need per project rather than the entire set.
• Cursor does not auto-detect when a skill applies. State the skill in your prompt explicitly.

Updating

Rules are file copies, not symlinks. To refresh, re-copy the relevant SKILL.md files.