> For clean Markdown of any page, append .md to the page URL.
> For a complete documentation index, see https://docs.astropods.com/llms.txt.
> For AI client integration (Claude Code, Cursor, etc.), connect to the MCP server at https://docs.astropods.com/_mcp/server.

# Overview

Astropods is a platform for building, deploying, and managing AI agents. It provides agent-native infrastructure for models, knowledge, tools, messaging, and observability.

With Astropods, you can develop an agent locally, publish it as a versioned blueprint, and deploy it as a hosted agent.

[Get started](/get-started)

Watch on [YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pIqjeyIKAc\&utm_source=docs\&utm_medium=embed\&utm_campaign=onboarding-to-astro).

## Get started

#### [Quickstart](/get-started)

Create an agent project, run it locally, and test your first agent

#### [The agent lifecycle](/agent-lifecycle)

Learn how a local project becomes a blueprint and then a running agent

#### [Install the CLI](/install-cli)

Install the `ast` CLI for your platform

#### [Publish a blueprint](/blueprints)

Build and push a versioned snapshot of your project to the registry

#### [Deploy an agent](/deploy-agent)

Deploy a blueprint as a hosted agent

## Explore Astropods

#### [AI Gateway](/ai-gateway)

Call managed models through an OpenAI-compatible API without a provider key

#### [Guides](/guides)

Follow task-based guides for frontends, storage, MCP servers, authorization, and more

#### [Messaging SDK](/messaging-sdk)

Connect agents to Slack, web chat, and other platforms over gRPC

#### [Knowledge stores](/knowledge-stores)

Connect data sources and make knowledge available to your agents

#### [Remote Sandbox](/remote-sandbox)

How sandboxes run your agent's code in an isolated virtual machine

#### [Monitor your agents](/monitor-agents)

Inspect token usage, tool calls, latency, and other runtime activity

#### [CLI reference](/cli)

Find commands for projects, blueprints, agents, accounts, and other resources

#### [API reference](/api-reference)

Use the REST API behind the CLI and dashboard

## Core concepts

* **Project** — A local agent codebase with an `astropods.yml` spec. Use `ast project create` to create a project, `ast project configure` to set credentials, and `ast project start` to run it locally.

* **Astropods Spec** — The declarative YAML configuration in `astropods.yml` that describes an agent's topology, including its container image, models, knowledge stores, tools, and ingestion pipelines. See [Astropods Spec](/astropods-package-spec).

* **Blueprint** — A versioned snapshot of a project pushed to the Astropods registry with `ast blueprint push`.

* **Agent** — A running instance of a blueprint deployed on the platform. Deploy an agent with `ast blueprint deploy` and manage it with `ast agent` commands.

* **Account** — The scope for Astropods platform resources. Blueprints, agents, and secrets belong to an account.

* **Secrets** — Encrypted credentials stored in the account vault and referenced when you deploy an agent.

* **Agent Card** — An `AGENT.md` file that controls how a blueprint appears in the catalog, including its description, tags, authors, and integrations. See [Make your agent discoverable](/agent-card).