Explainers

Agent workflows: when one prompt isn't enough

aaaa.fyi · 2026-07-02 · 5 min read

A single agent with a good prompt handles most tasks. Workflows exist for the rest: work that needs structure, repetition or more than one pair of hands.

When a workflow earns its keep

The task repeats. Weekly release notes, dependency updates, triage rotations — anything you'd otherwise re-prompt from scratch.

The task fans out. Reviewing 40 files, migrating 200 call sites. One agent per unit of work, results merged at the end.

The task needs checkpoints. Generate, then verify, then apply — with a human or a stricter agent between steps.

Patterns that keep showing up

Pipeline: each item flows through fixed stages (find → transform → verify). Fan-out/fan-in: split work across parallel agents, merge results. Generator + critic: one agent produces, another tries to break the output before it ships.

Where to find them

The Workflows section indexes runnable workflow repos — most are a config file plus instructions, installable in minutes. As with everything on the site, ranking is by real GitHub activity, not editorial choice.