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Sub-agents

Overview

A sub-agent is another Rival Agent that you’ve linked to a parent agent. During a chat (or a ritual run), the parent can delegate part of a task to the sub-agent, which runs its own turn with its own persona and tools and hands back a result.

Sub-agents let you build specialist agents (a researcher, a drafter, a reviewer) and compose them into a single experience for the user.

Limits - read this first

Sub-agents are deliberately constrained to keep behavior predictable:

  • One level deep. A sub-agent cannot have its own sub-agents. There are no grandchildren.
  • No recursion. A sub-agent cannot call back into the parent, and an agent cannot be a sub-agent of itself.
  • OAuth grants don’t inherit. If your sub-agent uses Gmail, it needs its own Gmail connection.

These limits are enforced by the platform - you can’t work around them. Plan flat hierarchies of specialists, not deep chains.

When to use a sub-agent

Reach for a sub-agent when:

  • You have a task with distinct stages - research → draft → format.
  • One agent needs a check or opinion from another - e.g. a policy reviewer before sending.
  • You want to keep each agent focused on what it does well, instead of stuffing one agent with every tool.

If you only need code to run on demand, attach a tool - not a sub-agent.

Attaching a sub-agent

Sub-agents are managed from the Sub-agents section of the agent editor.

  1. Open the parent agent’s editor.
  2. Click the Plus icon on the chat box and go to Sub Agents.
  3. Pick an agent from your organization or even the Marketplace. You can’t pick the parent itself, and you can’t pick an agent that would create a loop.
  4. Save.

The link appears in the sub-agents list. Removing a link only removes the link - the sub-agent itself stays in your org and can still be used elsewhere.

How it works in chat

When the parent decides to delegate, a card appears in the chat showing the sub-agent’s name and result. The sub-agent’s own internal tool calls are hidden to keep the chat readable. The user sees the parent’s final reply.

If multiple sub-agents run in the same turn, the chat shows a small progress indicator while they’re working. You can even select whether the sub-agents run in parallel or sequentially.

Memory and isolation

A sub-agent runs as its own agent with its own memory. The parent only passes the prompt - the sub-agent does not see the parent’s full conversation history, and the parent does not see inside the sub-agent’s memory.

This isolation matters for marketplace agents: adopting an agent that uses a third-party sub-agent will not leak your private context to the sub-agent’s publisher.

Sub-agents from the Marketplace

You can pick a published agent from the Agent Marketplace and link it as a sub-agent. The Marketplace listing has an Adopt action that brings the agent into your org first; once it’s in your org, you can attach it as a sub-agent from the editor.

Next steps