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Important
You need to be part of the Frontier preview program to get early access to Microsoft Agent 365. Frontier connects you directly with Microsoft’s latest AI innovations. Frontier previews are subject to the existing preview terms of your customer agreements. As these features are still in development, their availability and capabilities may change over time.
There are two artifacts built during the development lifecycle. These artifacts are required for an Agent 365 agent to exist:
- Agent Identity – Use the Agent 365 CLI to set up the agent blueprint, after which you can create agent instances and agent users in Microsoft 365 Admin Center and Teams. Learn more about agent identity
- Agent code – Use the Agent 365 SDK to extend your agent code with observability, tooling, and notifications. The open-source Agent 365 Samples repository provides samples that help you quickly start Agent 365 development.
The following sections list steps of the Agent 365 development lifecycle where these artifacts are built:
- Build and run agent
- Setup Agent 365 config
- Setup agent blueprint
- Deploy
- Publish agent to Microsoft 365 Admin Center
- Create Agent Instances
1. Build and run agent
Agent code is required to be set up to house the logic of your agent. This code can be an existing agent or you can build a new agent.
Build your agent using any agent SDK and host on any cloud service. If you don't already have this, we have samples using some of the most popular agent SDKs that you can use to get started quickly: microsoft/Agent365-Samples.
Depending on what Agent 365 features you'd like to add to your agent, use the Agent 365 SDK to add:
Observability – Here you have two options:
- Auto-instrumentation if you're using one of the popular supported agent SDKs (OpenAI, LangChain, Agent Framework) OR
- Manual instrumentation if not.
Notifications – Enables developers to build agents that can respond to events and notifications from Microsoft 365 applications.
Tooling – Enables developers to add various powerful tool functionalities to their agents like Email, Calendar, and Word.
Agent Identity - Enables developers to build agents that can use their own unique agent identities for tool calls, observability, etc.
When you're done, your agent should run in Visual Studio Code or other IDE with no errors. Learn to test agents with or without the Agent Identity.
2. Setup Agent 365 config
The Agent 365 CLI needs to know your tenant, subscription and other details, to create the required agent resources like Agent Blueprint.
Follow these steps to create a valid Agent 365 config: Setup Agent 365 config.
Note
If you already have a deployed agent, you need to specify the messaging endpoint in the config as described in Set agent messaging endpoint.
When you're done, you should have a valid configuration file called a365.config.json with all details filled correctly.
3. Setup agent blueprint
The blueprint defines your agent's identity, permissions, and infrastructure requirements. Every agent instance that gets onboarded is created off this agent blueprint.
You need a valid Agent 365 config file from step 2.
Learn how to setup agent blueprint
When you're done, you have all necessary Azure resources: agent blueprint, MCP permissions on blueprint, service principal.
4. Deploy
You need to deploy your agent code to an online application so that each agent instance can run on it.
This step is optional if you already have your agent running on Azure or another cloud service like Amazon Web Services (AWS) or Google Cloud Platform (GCP).
You need working agent code from step 1 to deploy.
Learn how to deploy an agent to Azure.
Note
If you already have a deployed agent, you need to specify the messaging endpoint in the config. Learn how to set the agent messaging endpoint. For example:
When you're done, you have a working web app in Azure (or other cloud) running your Agent 365 agent code. You can further configure it to improve reliability and availability by adding more server instances for example.
5. Publish agent to Microsoft 365 Admin Center
Publishing your agent allows admins to create instances and manage governance via the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.
Learn how to publish and agent to Microsoft Admin Center
When you're done, you should have an agent visible on the registry in Microsoft Admin Center.
6. Create Agent Instances
This enables users to create instances of agents from the agent blueprint used as a template.
You need the following:
- Agent blueprint correctly set up as described in step 3 step.
- Agent application correctly published as described in step 5 step.
Learn how to create agent instances
When you're done, your agent should appear in your organization chart, reporting to you and available for communication using Teams or email. This can take a few minutes.