Agent Configuration

This page is being phased out. For the current way to configure an agent, see Apps and Agents and Build an Agentic App in the User Guide.

Personal Agents are great for day-to-day assistance, but you can create Specialized Custom Agents for dedicated tasks like customer support, weekly reporting, and bug hunting. Custom Agents run on the Agno framework and give you full control over the model, memory, instructions, tools, and channels.

Need to run on a framework other than Agno (e.g., OpenAI Agents SDK, LangChain, Google ADK, AWS Strands)? Framework choice is available on the Enterprise plan. Contact sales to enable it for your workspace.

Create Your Agent

Go to app.xpander.ai and sign in or sign up. New users get a 14-day free trial.

Start a new agent

Click + New Agent in the top right of the Agents page.

xpander Agents page with the + New Agent button in the top right

Name your agent

Environment will already be set to xpander-cloud, which is the default hosting setup, fully-managed by Xpander.

Create New Agent dialog with Agent name field and Environment dropdown showing xpander cloud

On the Self-hosted Enterprise plan, you can spin up Xpander’s AI Agents on your own compute environments. Contact sales to learn more.

Wait for provisioning

Xpander sets up your agent’s container and wires up memory, built-in tools, and networking. This one-time setup takes a minute or two.

Agent setup modal showing container spinning up

Open the Agent Studio

You’re ready to try out your newly created agent.Click the gear icon in the top left to open the configuration panel.

Agent Studio showing Builder view with chat interface and gear icon

Publish

When you’re ready, click Publish in the top right. You need to publish every time you change configuration before it takes effect.

Tour the Agent Studio

The Agent Studio has two views:

Builder: Configure your agent and chat with it directly
Monitor: View conversation logs, performance metrics, and task history

Agent Studio header showing Builder and Monitor tabs

Configuration Quick Reference

Xpander’s Custom Agents expose full Agno configuration options. Click the gear icon in the Builder view to open the configuration panel.

Tab	What you configure
General	Model, access, output format, guardrails, notifications.
Instructions	System prompt - role, goals, rules, expected output.
Tools	Built-in tools, connectors, thinking controls.
Channels	API, SDK, Chat, Slack, Webhook, Task, MCP, A2A.
Memory	Session history, user and agent memories, compression.

General

High-level agent properties and model selection.

Setting	What it does
Name	Your agent’s display name.
LLM settings	Pick a provider and model. See AI Models & Intelligence.
Access	Private to you, or shared with your organization.
Output format	Free-form text, Markdown, Structured output, or Voice.
Learning	Capture user profiles and knowledge over time. See Memory & State.
LLM Guardrails	PII detection, prompt injection blocks, and OpenAI moderation. See LLM Guardrails.
Multi-Agent	Attach other agents for orchestration.
Knowledge bases	Attach knowledge bases for retrieval. See Knowledge Bases.
Templates	Save the current configuration as a reusable template.
Notifications	Success and error alerts via Email, Webhook, or Slack.
Danger zone	Disable or delete the agent.

Instructions

The agent’s system prompt.

Field	What it does
Agent role	The agent’s role or personality.
Goals	What the agent should accomplish.
Instructions	Rules and behavior constraints.
Expected output	How the agent should format its responses.

Click Write instructions with AI to prompt an LLM to fill these fields for you.

Tools

Built-in tools, connectors, and thinking controls. See Tools & Connectors.

Section	What it does
Built-in tools	Toggle xpander’s built-in tools (Send Email, OCR, etc.).
Tools	Connect external apps via MCP or API. See Tools & Connectors.
Agent Thinking & Planning	Checklist Toolkit, Checklist Enforcement, and Reasoning Toolkit. See AI Models & Intelligence.
Advanced Configuration	Max tool calls per run.

Channels

How users and systems reach your agent - API, SDK, Chat, Slack, Webhook, Task, MCP, and A2A. See Deploy an Agent for setup on each channel.

Memory

What the agent remembers across conversations. See Memory & State.

Setting	What it does
Session storage	Persist chat history across sessions.
User Memories	Store per-user memories.
Agent Memories	Store agent-wide memories across all users.
Max tool calls from history	Cap tool calls included in context.
Session summaries	Summarize long conversations automatically.
Tool calls compression	Shrink verbose tool outputs in context.
Memory optimization strategy	Optimize the context window during execution.

Common Use Cases

I want my agent to…	What to configure
Answer questions about my company’s docs	Attach a Knowledge Base with your documents
Send emails and search the web	Enable built-in tools (Send Email, Web Search)
Integrate with Slack, Jira, GitHub, etc.	Install connector tools from the catalog
Remember user preferences across conversations	Enable User Memories in the Memory tab
Learn and improve over time	Enable Agent Memories with agentic management
Handle complex multi-step tasks	Enable Checklist Toolkit or Planning Mode
Give deeper, more thorough answers	Enable Reasoning Toolkit or increase reasoning effort
Respond in structured JSON	Set Output format to Structured output in General tab
Run on a framework other than Agno	Contact sales to enable framework choice on Enterprise
Run agents in your own infrastructure	Contact sales to enable self-hosted locations on Enterprise

Next Steps

Tools & Connectors

Browse 100+ connectors and configure tool behavior

AI Models & Intelligence

Providers, planning mode, and reasoning mode

Memory & State

Session storage, user memories, and agent memories

Deploy an Agent

Publish and connect to Slack, API, SDK, and more

Overview

Platform

Getting Started

Building Agents

Workflows

Agentic Automation

Observability

Deployment Channels

Deployment Guides

Self-Hosted

Security & Compliance

Create Your Agent

Tour the Agent Studio