Where to Find Agent Skills: Directories and Marketplaces Compared
2026-10-30
Short answer: most agent skills live in public GitHub repositories, and directories index them and add search, rankings and, in some cases, security checks. The main places to look are skills.sh, Skills Directory, MCP Market, Smithery's skills page, LobeHub's market, vendor repositories such as anthropics/skills, GitHub code search and Skill Store 33. They differ most in what they check and whether your agent can search them itself.
Disclosure: Skill Store 33 publishes this article. We describe every site, ours included, only from its own pages, as of Oct 30, 2026. Counts are each site's own figures. They move daily, and the sites don't count the same way.
First: agentskills.io is the standard, not a directory
agentskills.io hosts the Agent Skills specification, a quickstart, guides for writing and evaluating skills, and a Client Showcase of agents that support the format. It says the format was originally developed by Anthropic and released as an open standard. It doesn't list skills, so use it to learn the format and the sites below to find skills.
The comparison
| Site | What it lists (own figure) | Search | Licence shown | Security or verification | Agent or API access |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| skills.sh (Vercel) | Public GitHub skills installed with its CLI; no total skill count stated | Search box, leaderboard by installs, topics, per-agent pages | Not on the home page | Partner audits (Gen, Socket, Snyk) on each skill page | npx skills add CLI; JSON API |
| Skills Directory | 679,428 indexed skills (home page); over 100,000 (About page) | Site search and categories; semantic search on Pro API | Not on the home page | Automated scan of SKILL.md, A to F grade | API with key (free tier); MCP server for Pro |
| MCP Market | 372,895 skills | Search box, 20 categories, Top 100 leaderboard | Not stated | None described on the skills page | MCP Market Hub plugin; some paid skills |
| Smithery skills | 25,355 skills found | Categories, Verified filter, namespace | Not shown | Verified badge | API, CLI and accounts shut down Oct 31, 2026 |
| LobeHub Market | No total stated on its skills doc page | CLI search by keyword and category | Not mentioned | Not described | npx @lobehub/market-cli, after register |
| Vendor repos (anthropics/skills, openai/skills) | Each vendor's own skills | Browse the repository | Yes, per repo or per skill | None; Anthropic says test before relying on them | Claude Code plugin marketplace; Codex $skill-installer |
| GitHub code search | Every SKILL.md on a public default branch | path: qualifier | Repo licence, if any | None | Sign-in required |
| Skill Store 33 | About 60,000 skills, mainly imported from the skills.sh index | Search by task, categories | Yes, on every skill page | State on every page; nearly all Not yet verified | Public MCP server, no sign-in |
skills.sh
Run by Vercel, which says the CLI, ingestion pipeline and site are open source. A skill appears once people install it with npx skills add <owner/repo>, and rankings come from anonymous, deduplicated install counts that the CLI sends when users opt in. Partner providers (Gen Agent Trust Hub, Socket and Snyk) audit indexed skills, and the results appear on each skill's page. skills.sh says skills that fail every partner audit are excluded, and still recommends reading a SKILL.md before installing. Its JSON API covers the leaderboard, search and audit results, with a Vercel OIDC token for authenticated use.
Skills Directory
Calls itself the security-first directory of agent skills. Its home page said 679,428 indexed skills on Oct 30, 2026, and its About page says over 100,000. Every listed skill gets an automated scan of its SKILL.md and a grade from A to F. Its methodology says bundled scripts are listed but don't affect the grade, that an A means fewer risk signals were found, not that a skill is safe, and that sponsors cannot buy a grade. The API needs a key: the free tier gives 100 requests a day, and Pro members can also connect Claude Code through its MCP server, which has six tools.
MCP Market
Lists 372,895 skills across 20 categories, with a Top 100 leaderboard and a daily ranking. The page doesn't say what the rankings measure. It is also a marketplace: there is a Sell Skills page, and some listings show a premium price. Its MCP Market Hub plugin installs, updates and syncs skills across Claude, Cursor and Codex. Its install guide covers uploading a ZIP in claude.ai, skill folders in Claude Code and the Claude API.
Smithery
Smithery's skills page listed 25,355 skills on Oct 30, 2026, with a Verified filter and a banner about its shutdown. Its notice says the MCP proxy, the API, Connect, Toolbox, accounts, API keys, CLI and SDKs stop working on Oct 31, 2026, and that smithery.ai stays as a public directory of MCP servers, now powered by Arcade.dev. The notice doesn't mention the skills listing, so check before you rely on it.
LobeHub Market
lobehub.com/skills leads to a CLI reference at market.lobehub.com rather than a browsing page. An agent runs npx -y @lobehub/market-cli skills search --q "keyword", then skills install with --agent set to claude-code, codex, cursor or open-claw. Each command needs a one-time register step first. The page doesn't give a skill count, licences or how skills are vetted.
Vendor repositories
anthropics/skills is Anthropic's public skills repository: creative, technical, enterprise and document skills. Many are Apache 2.0. The docx, pdf, pptx and xlsx skills are source-available, not open source. In Claude Code you add it with /plugin marketplace add anthropics/skills. Anthropic says the skills are for demonstration and educational purposes and should be tested before you rely on them.
openai/skills was the skills catalog for Codex, installed with $skill-installer, with each skill's licence in its own LICENSE.txt. It is now marked deprecated and points to github.com/openai/plugins for current Codex skill and plugin examples. Many other vendors publish skills in their own repositories, and the directories above index many of them.
GitHub code search
The raw source for every directory above. Search for path:/(^|\/)SKILL\.md$/ plus a topic word to find skill files directly. You must be signed in to GitHub, and only default branches are searched. There is no ranking by quality and no vetting, so judge the repository yourself.
Skill Store 33
Our store, run by ReadyAI, lists about 60,000 skills. Nearly all are imported from public sources, mainly the skills.sh index of public GitHub repositories. About 100 come from vendor or community repositories we track directly. Each skill page shows the publisher, source repository, licence, approximate token size and verification state: Not yet verified, Safety scanned, Verified (the skill's own tests ran in a sandbox and passed) or Tests failing. Today nearly every skill is Not yet verified. ReadyAI also runs SN33, a Bittensor subnet. So far one store skill comes from it.
Its MCP server at https://mcp.ss33.ai needs no sign-in. Your agent describes a task to search_skills, reads the best match with get_skill, and can report back with report_skill_outcome.
How to choose
Want to see what is popular? skills.sh ranks by installs. Want a security grade? Skills Directory and skills.sh show scan or audit results. Want to buy or sell? MCP Market has paid listings. Want your agent to search by task without you leaving the terminal? Pick one with an MCP server or CLI: Skills Directory (Pro), LobeHub or Skill Store 33. Want a vendor's own version? Go to its repository.
Wherever you find a skill, a scan or a badge doesn't replace reading it. A skill runs with your agent's permissions.
FAQ
Is agentskills.io a skills directory?
No. It hosts the specification, guides and a showcase of agents that support skills. It doesn't list skills.
Which agent skills directory is the biggest?
The counts aren't comparable. Each site counts differently, and many skills are copies of others: in our own catalog, one search for a frontend design skill returned ten publishers' copies with the same description. On Oct 30, 2026, Skills Directory's home page said 679,428, MCP Market 372,895 and Smithery's skills page 25,355.
Does Smithery still list skills after October 31?
Its notice keeps smithery.ai as a directory of MCP servers and doesn't mention skills. Check the page before you depend on it.
Can my agent search a skills directory directly?
Yes, with some. Skills Directory offers an MCP server to Pro members. Skill Store 33's MCP server is public. skills.sh has a JSON API, and LobeHub has a CLI.
Let your agent search Skill Store 33
Skill Store 33 runs a public MCP server at https://mcp.ss33.ai. Connect it once and your agent can search about 60,000 skills by task, read what each one does, and fetch the one that fits. In Claude Code, run:
claude mcp add --transport http skill-store https://mcp.ss33.ai
Without an account your agent gets 5 searches a minute. A free account gives you a key with 60 searches a minute: create one on your account page, then add it to the connection as an Authorization: Bearer <key> header.
Sources
skills.sh home, About, FAQ, API docs and Audits pages: https://skills.sh/, https://skills.sh/about, https://skills.sh/docs/faq, https://skills.sh/docs/api, https://skills.sh/audits (read Oct 30, 2026)
Agent Skills overview and docs index: https://agentskills.io/home, https://agentskills.io/llms.txt (read Oct 30, 2026)
Skills Directory home, About, security methodology and API docs: https://www.skillsdirectory.com/, https://www.skillsdirectory.com/about, https://www.skillsdirectory.com/security/methodology, https://www.skillsdirectory.com/api-docs (read Oct 30, 2026)
MCP Market skills and install guide: https://mcpmarket.com/tools/skills, https://mcpmarket.com/tools/skills/how-to-install (read Oct 30, 2026)
Smithery skills page and shutdown notice: https://smithery.ai/skills, https://smithery.ai/future (read Oct 30, 2026)
LobeHub Market skills CLI reference: https://market.lobehub.com/s/skills (read Oct 30, 2026)
Anthropic, anthropics/skills: https://github.com/anthropics/skills; OpenAI, openai/skills: https://github.com/openai/skills (read Oct 30, 2026)
GitHub Docs, code search syntax and About GitHub code search: https://docs.github.com/en/search-github/github-code-search/understanding-github-code-search-syntax, https://docs.github.com/en/search-github/github-code-search/about-github-code-search (read Oct 30, 2026)
This article was created with the help of AI (AI-Assisted). Every site was described from its own pages in the Sources list, read on Oct 30, 2026. ReadyAI is accountable for the content.