Agent Skill
Idea Refine skill
idea-refineaddyosmani/agent-skillsskills/idea-refine/SKILL.md
Refines raw ideas into sharp, actionable concepts through structured divergent and convergent thinking. Use when an idea is still vague, when you need to stress-test assumptions before committing to a plan, or when you want to expand options before converging on one. Triggers on "ideate", "refine this idea", or "stress-test my plan".
always on
75 tokname + description
once used
2,014 tokSKILL.md body
bundled files
41 scripts
repo stars
109kGitHub
Install the Idea Refine skill
Skills CLI (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor and others)
npx skills add https://github.com/addyosmani/agent-skills --skill idea-refine
Claude Code, by hand (all projects)
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/addyosmani/agent-skills.git /tmp/agent-skills mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills cp -R /tmp/agent-skills/skills/idea-refine ~/.claude/skills/idea-refine
For one project only, copy the folder into .claude/skills/ in that project instead. The agent picks it up when a task matches its description.
What it costs your context
Agent Skills load in three steps. Tokens counted with the o200k tokenizer; your model's count will differ a little.
| When | What loads | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Every session | Name and description | 75 tok |
| When the agent uses it | The SKILL.md instructions | 2,014 tok |
| Only if opened | 4 bundled files (31 KB) | varies |
Until it is used, idea-refine costs about 18× less than the median MCP server we measured (1,362 tokens on every turn). Installing all 25 skills from addyosmani/agent-skills would load 1,829 tokens of descriptions. Skills vs MCP study
Checks
- Ships scripts the agent can run. Read them before installing.
Checked 2026-10-22 · method
What's inside
The headings of its SKILL.md. Read the full file on GitHub.
- Idea Refine
- Overview
- When to Use
- How It Works
- Usage
- Output
- Detailed Instructions
- Philosophy
- Process
- Anti-patterns to Avoid
- Tone
- Common Rationalizations
- Red Flags
- Verification
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