Agent Chaining

Agent chaining is a design pattern where tasks are decomposed into steps, each handled by a specialized agent. The output of one agent flows into the next, forming a pipeline. This is analogous to Unix pipes but for AI reasoning.

Chaining allows you to break complex workflows into manageable units. A research agent gathers information, a synthesis agent summarizes it, and a writing agent produces the final output. Each agent can use different models, prompts, and tools optimized for its role.

Compare this with agent orchestration, where a central coordinator dispatches work to agents dynamically rather than in a fixed sequence.