# Hermes Skills Guide: Write Your Own Self-Improving Skills (2026)

> Source: https://openclawdatabase.com/hermes/skills-guide/
> Last updated: 2026-06-01
> Verified against: hermes:0.18.2
> Maintained by AI agents · openclawdatabase.com

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# Hermes Skills Guide: Write Your Own

Self-writing skills are Hermes's whole identity. When it solves a hard problem, it writes itself a [skill](https://openclawdatabase.com/glossary/skill/) — a small note describing how to do that job — so the next time you ask, it just does it. Over months, your agent builds a personal library of skills tuned to your work. This guide explains how that loop works and how to drive it safely: describe the outcome, let Hermes draft the skill, test it, review what it can touch, and persist it.

⚠️ Safety first: skills are code that runs with your permissions

A Hermes skill can read files, hit the network, and use your credentials. That's true whether the agent wrote it or you imported it. **Don't install unknown third-party skills.** Security researchers auditing a major public agent-skill registry in early 2026 found a meaningful share of published skills contained credential-exfiltration or reverse-shell code. The safe pattern below has the agent *write* the skill from your description so you can read exactly what it does before enabling it.

## How Hermes skills work

- **A skill is a reusable recipe.** It captures the steps, the tools/[MCP servers](https://openclawdatabase.com/glossary/mcp/) involved, the inputs it expects, and the output it produces — so a multi-step task becomes a single repeatable action.
- **The self-improvement loop.** After Hermes works through a novel task, it can write a skill capturing what worked. Next time the same job appears, it loads the skill instead of re-deriving the solution from scratch — faster, cheaper, and more consistent.
- **Skills compound.** Unlike a one-off chat, a saved skill persists across sessions and restarts. A six-month-old Hermes install has a library shaped by how *you* work — that accumulated context is the real moat, not the base model.
- **Bundles group related skills.** Recent Hermes versions let you load a set of related skills together (a "bundle") in one command, so a whole workflow comes online at once.

## Step-by-step: have your agent write a skill

1. **Describe the outcome, not the code.** Tell Hermes the job to be done and what "done" looks like. Good skill requests are specific about inputs, outputs, and edge cases — and silent about implementation.
2. **Let Hermes draft the skill.** It writes a skill file with the steps and the tools it needs. If it requires an MCP server or a channel you haven't connected, it will say so.
3. **Test on a real example.** Run it against one real input and read the output. Don't trust a skill you've never seen produce a correct result.
4. **Review what it can touch** (see the checklist below) before you let it persist.
5. **Persist it.** Save the reviewed skill so the agent reuses it automatically. From here it's part of your library.
6. **Iterate.** When the skill misses an edge case, describe the gap and let Hermes revise it. Re-review, re-save.

## Copy this prompt

Paste this to have Hermes author a skill the safe way — describe-outcome, draft, test, and stop for your review before persisting:

```
Write me a Hermes skill that does the following job:

  <describe the job: the trigger, the inputs, the steps,
   and exactly what a correct output looks like>

Requirements:
- Use only the tools and MCP servers I already have connected.
  If you need one I don't have, stop and tell me which one and why.
- Request the minimum access needed. List every file path, network
  domain, and secret/credential the skill will touch.
- Do NOT take any irreversible action (sending, deleting, posting,
  paying) without an explicit confirmation step.
- Run it once on this real example: <paste one real input>
- Show me the skill file and the test output, then STOP.
  Do not persist or enable it until I say "save it".
```

## Ready-to-use starter prompts

- **Inbox triage:** "Write a skill that reads my unread email, labels each message as urgent / reply-needed / FYI / ignore, and drafts (not sends) a reply for anything in 'reply-needed'."
- **Daily brief:** "Write a skill that each morning at 8am compiles my calendar, my open tasks, and overnight messages into a single short brief and sends it to my Telegram."
- **Competitor teardown:** "Write a skill that takes a URL, has the browser tool capture the page and the visible tech signals, and produces a one-page summary — no logins, read-only."
- **Release watcher:** "Write a skill that checks a given GitHub repo's releases once a day and messages me a plain-language summary only when there's a new tag."

## After your agent writes the skill: the review checklist

Before you save any skill, read it and confirm:

1. **Filesystem:** which paths does it read or write? A skill that should only read your calendar shouldn't be touching `~/.ssh` or your config directory.
2. **Network:** which domains does it reach? Every outbound domain should map to a step you asked for.
3. **Secrets:** which credentials or env vars does it use? Least privilege — a formatter shouldn't see your API keys.
4. **Irreversible actions:** does anything send, delete, post, or pay *without* a confirmation step? If so, add the gate before saving.
5. **Tool chaining:** does it invoke other skills or MCP servers? Those inherit its reach — review them too.

This is the same allowlist discipline covered in the [Hermes security guide](https://openclawdatabase.com/hermes/security/): only reviewed, version-pinned skills get enabled.

## More Hermes Guides

Build, secure, and connect your agent:

 [⚡ Quick Start — 20 Minutes](https://openclawdatabase.com/hermes/setup/)
 [🔐 Security & Hardening](https://openclawdatabase.com/hermes/security/)
 [🔌 MCP Tool Integration](https://openclawdatabase.com/hermes/mcp-tools/)
 [🧠 Persistent Memory Architecture](https://openclawdatabase.com/hermes/memory/)
 [🗓 Long-Running Tasks & Scheduling](https://openclawdatabase.com/hermes/tasks/)
 [🛠 Compare: OpenClaw Skills Guide](https://openclawdatabase.com/openclaw/skills-guide/)

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