Which is more popular, A2A or Skills?

Skills has more GitHub stars (179,388 vs 25,989).

Which is more actively developed, A2A or Skills?

A2A had more commits in the last 90 days (56 vs 14).

Compare their capabilities, limitations and "best for" notes above. Trying each on a small task is the fastest way to decide.

Side-by-side comparison of two AI agent tools

Skills is growing faster: +26,013 GitHub stars in the last 30 days vs +496 for A2A.
Pick A2A for: agent2Agent (A2A) is an open protocol enabling communication and interoperability between opaque agentic. Pick Skills for: public repository for Agent Skills.

From GitHub data refreshed daily.

A2Aopen-source

Agent2Agent (A2A) is an open protocol enabling communication and interoperability between opaque agentic applications.

Public repository for Agent Skills

+Standardized protocol enabling interoperability between different agentic systems regardless of implementation
+Strong community adoption with 22,866 GitHub stars and comprehensive multi-language documentation support
+Open source with Apache 2.0 license and Python SDK available on PyPI for easy integration

+Official Anthropic implementation provides reliable, well-tested skill patterns and best practices for Claude AI development
+Extensive collection covering diverse domains from creative tasks to enterprise workflows, offering immediate practical value
+Self-contained modular design allows easy customization and extension of existing skills for specific organizational needs

-May require significant refactoring of existing agent systems to adopt the protocol
-Potential performance overhead when routing communications through the protocol layer

-Skills are Claude-specific and may not be directly portable to other AI agents or platforms
-Some skills are source-available only (not open source), limiting modification rights for certain components
-Repository serves primarily as demonstration material, requiring thorough testing before production deployment

•Multi-agent systems where specialized agents need to coordinate and share information across different platforms
•Enterprise environments with various AI tools that need to communicate and collaborate on complex workflows
•Distributed agent networks where agents from different organizations or vendors must interoperate

•Enterprise teams standardizing AI workflows with consistent document creation, branding, and communication processes
•Developers building Claude-powered applications needing reference implementations for complex multi-step tasks
•Organizations creating custom AI skills who need proven architectural patterns from Anthropic's production implementations

Which is more popular, A2A or Skills?: Skills has more GitHub stars (179,388 vs 25,989).
Which is more actively developed, A2A or Skills?: A2A had more commits in the last 90 days (56 vs 14).
Should I use A2A or Skills?: Compare their capabilities, limitations and "best for" notes above. Trying each on a small task is the fastest way to decide.