Chat with Elastic Agent Builder agents
Agent Chat is the chat interface for natural language conversations with your agents.
The chat GUI and programmatic interfaces enable real-time communication where you can ask questions, request data analysis, and receive immediate responses from your configured agents.
The chat UI is available in both standalone and flyout modes. For more information, refer to Chat UI modes.
Refer to the getting started guide if you need to enable the feature and ingest some data.
Find Agents in the navigation menu to begin chatting. You can also search for Agent Builder in the global search bar.
This takes you to the chat GUI:
- Chat input area
- Agent selector
- Model selector
- Chats (conversation history)
- Options menu
- Customize accordion
- Manage components link
Use the text input area to chat with an agent in real time. Check the agent selector to see which agent is active. To switch agents, refer to Select a different agent.
Conversations with agents consume tokens. To understand how usage is calculated, refer to Token usage in Elastic Agent Builder.
Use the agent selector to switch agents, to navigate to the agent management section, or to create a new agent. An agent's behavior is defined by its custom instructions and available tools. Switch agents when you need different capabilities for your tasks.
Use the model selector to switch the underlying model the agent uses to generate responses. Switch models to prioritize faster responses, lower costs, or more complex reasoning, depending on your use case.
Click the three-dot menu icon in the top-right corner to access additional options.
The options menu provides access to:
- Agent details: View information about the currently selected agent.
- GenAI Settings: Open the global GenAI settings page to configure default connectors and other AI settings.
To manage agents and tools, use the Manage components link at the bottom of the left sidebar, or the Customize accordion to configure the current agent.
This menu provides links to key actions and management pages, including agent management, tool management, agent editing, and duplication.
Use the chat history panel to access previous conversations.
Expand the Reasoning section to see how the agent handles your request. This provides a detailed breakdown of the agent's reasoning steps, the tool calls it makes, and the responses it receives. The agent runs tools in a loop until it achieves its goal or exceeds the maximum conversation length.
Select Inspect response to view detailed information about individual tool calls and responses.
Select View JSON to view the full raw response data. For more information, refer to Monitor token usage.
You control every write operation an agent performs. Whenever an agent proposes to create, update, or delete a resource, the chat pauses and presents a preview before anything takes effect. The preview format and available actions depend on the skill the agent is using.
No changes are applied until you explicitly confirm or dismiss.
The Customize accordion in the left sidebar provides agent-scoped configuration for the currently selected agent. Expand it to access the following pages:
- Overview
- Displays a summary of the selected agent, including the total count of assigned skills and tools. Use the quick links to edit the agent's instructions or settings.
- Skills
- Lists the skills assigned to the current agent. Click a skill to open a read-only detail panel on the right side. To assign new skills, click Add skill. To view and manage all skills across the deployment, click Manage all skills. Skills you import into the library must be turned on with their toggle in this list before the agent can use them. For how skills work and how to manage them, refer to Skills in Elastic Agent Builder.
- Plugins
- Lists the plugins assigned to the current agent.
- Tools
- Lists the tools assigned to the current agent. Click a tool to open a read-only detail panel. To assign new tools, click Add tool. To view and manage all tools, click Manage all tools.
The Manage components link at the bottom of the left sidebar exits the single-agent view. It provides an overview of all agents, skills, plugins, connectors, and tools available across the deployment.
- Agents
- View all agents in the deployment. The list displays each agent's name, visibility badge (Public, Shared, or Read-only), and any custom labels. From this page, you can create new agents, edit existing ones, or start a chat.
- Skills
- View and manage all skills available in the deployment. Create new skills or edit existing ones.
- Plugins
- View and install plugins for the deployment so you can assign their bundled skills and capabilities to agents.
- Connectors
- View and manage Kibana connectors for GenAI and related features, including LLM providers and other integrations agents and tools use.
- Tools
- View and manage all tools. The global Tools page includes a search bar, Labels filter, Manage MCP dropdown, Manage agents link, and + New tool button.
You can also reach the global agents list from the Manage agents button in the agent selector dropdown.
Agents can create and manage dashboards and visualizations directly in the conversation. To learn more, refer to Dashboards and visualizations in chat.
The Agent Chat API provides programmatic access to chat functionality through REST endpoints.
For a quick overview of the REST API for conversations, refer to Chat and conversations API.
For the complete API reference, refer to the Kibana API reference.