Agent Skills

Agent Skills provide your AI coding assistant with structured context about Neon's platform, APIs, and best practices. With skills installed, your assistant produces more accurate code and avoids common mistakes when working with Neon, from Postgres and Auth to Neon Functions, Object Storage, and the AI Gateway.

Install

There are several ways to install Neon skills depending on your editor and workflow.

npx skills

For any AI tool that supports the Agent Skills format, install skills from the Agent Skills repository:

npx skills add neondatabase/agent-skills -y

This installs all skills in the repository. To install a specific skill instead, pass the -s flag:

npx skills add neondatabase/agent-skills -s neon-postgres -y

Useful flags:

• -y skips the interactive prompt and installs immediately
• -s selects one or more skills (repeat the flag for multiple skills)
• -g installs globally instead of at the project level (see Project-level vs. global install)

Cursor plugin

If you're using Cursor, install the Neon plugin from the marketplace. It bundles core Postgres skills and the Neon MCP Server in one package.

In Cursor chat, run:

/add-plugin neon-postgres

Or install from cursor.com/marketplace/neon. See Cursor plugin for Neon for details.

Claude Code plugin

If you're using Claude Code, install the Neon plugin for skills and MCP integration:

/plugin marketplace add neondatabase/agent-skills
/plugin install neon-postgres@neon

See Claude Code plugin for Neon for details.

Codex plugin

If you're using OpenAI Codex, install the Neon Postgres plugin from the Codex plugin directory (in the Codex app under Plugins, or in the Codex CLI with /plugins). It includes the Neon Postgres app (MCP), the main Neon skill, and the egress optimizer skill.

See Codex plugin for Neon for details.

neon init

The neon init command sets up your project to use Neon with your AI coding assistant. It authenticates via OAuth, creates an API key, configures the MCP server, installs the Neon extension for Cursor and VS Code where applicable, and installs agent skills at the project level:

npx neon@latest init

If you're using the Neon backend beta (Functions, Storage, AI Gateway), use neon init --preview instead. See the Neon backend beta guide for access and setup.

After running init, restart your editor and ask your AI assistant to "Get started with Neon" to launch the interactive onboarding guide. See the neon init reference for details.

Available skills

Skills are grouped by area. Each skill is a SKILL.md entry point that your agent reads and invokes when relevant. Browse and install individual skills on skills.sh.

Core

Start here for platform overview and Postgres development.

Database workflows

Provision, branch, and optimize Postgres projects.

Neon Platform

Use Neon services beyond core Postgres. Functions, Object Storage, and AI Gateway are in beta. See Check your access before using these skills in production workflows.

Agent platforms

For codegen tools and multi-tenant products that provision Neon for their users, see the companion skill in neondatabase/neon-for-agent-platforms (neon-postgres-agent-platforms on skills.sh).

Project-level vs. global install

Skills can be installed at two levels:

• Project level (default): Skills are installed in your project directory, for example via neon init or npx skills add. Your AI assistant picks them up when working in that project. This is best for team workflows since the configuration can be committed with the project.

• Global: Skills are installed at the user or system level and available across all projects. Useful for personal development environments where you want Neon context everywhere. Pass the -g flag to install globally:

  npx skills add neondatabase/agent-skills -y -g

What's covered

With the full skill set installed, your assistant can guide you across the Neon platform:

Postgres and platform basics (neon, neon-postgres)

• Getting started with Neon, including project setup and key features (branching, autoscaling, scale-to-zero, instant restore, read replicas)
• Connections, including the serverless driver, connection pooling, and connection strings
• Authentication with Managed Better Auth
• Data API via @neondatabase/neon-js
• Platform APIs and SDKs, including the REST API, TypeScript SDK, and Python SDK
• Developer tools, including the CLI, VS Code extension, and MCP server

Database workflows

• Disposable databases via Claimable Postgres for agents and tests
• Branch types and workflows for migrations, schema-only branches, and reset-from-parent
• Egress optimization for high transfer costs and query anti-patterns

Platform services (beta)

• Neon Functions: declare, deploy, and connect long-running compute next to your database
• Object Storage: S3-compatible storage that branches with your data
• AI Gateway: model routing, logging, and cost controls with a single Neon credential

For example, ask your assistant to "set up Managed Better Auth in my Next.js app" and it will provide the correct imports, configuration, and middleware setup. Or ask it to "add an AI Gateway route in my neon.ts file" and it will follow beta constraints and the right SDK patterns.

Example prompts

Get started with Neon

Recommend a connection method for this project

Set up Drizzle ORM with Neon

Set up Managed Better Auth for my Next.js app

Create a Neon branch for this feature

Give me a quick temporary Postgres database

Why is my Neon bill so high?

Add a serverless function to my Neon branch

Set up S3-compatible storage in neon.ts

Route LLM calls through the Neon AI Gateway

How it works

Your AI assistant reads the SKILL.md file to understand what Neon guidance is available. When you ask about a specific topic, the skill fetches the relevant documentation from online, so your assistant always has up-to-date context without bundling everything locally. For the complete source, see the Agent Skills repository.