Note
Access to this page requires authorization. You can try signing in or changing directories.
Access to this page requires authorization. You can try changing directories.
[This article is prerelease documentation and is subject to change.]
Use connected agents to let your primary agent delegate a request to an independent agent hosted in Microsoft Foundry. Unlike a sub-agent, a connected agent keeps its own configuration and lifecycle management, separate from your primary agent.
Tip
Connected agents can't reference tools, topics, events, sub-agents, or variables from the primary agent's orchestration. See best practices for working with sub-agents for a full comparison of what primary agents, sub-agents, and connected agents can each reference.
Prerequisites
- A primary agent created with the Customer Conversation harness. See Create a new agent (Customer Conversation).
- A Microsoft Foundry agent to connect to. The Foundry agent must have the Activity protocol endpoint enabled. A newly created Foundry agent exposes only the Responses and A2A protocol endpoints by default; if the Activity endpoint isn't enabled, the connection fails at runtime with a 400 error. You can enable the Activity endpoint:
- By publishing the Foundry agent to Microsoft 365 and Teams. Learn more in Publish agents to Microsoft Copilot and Microsoft Teams.
- Programmatically, using the REST API or the Python SDK. Learn more in Configure and share your Microsoft Foundry agent.
- Access to the Foundry project endpoint URL for the agent you want to connect to.
Prepare your Foundry agent
Before you can add a connected agent, locate and publish the agent in the Microsoft Foundry portal, then copy the values you'll need to create the connection:
- In the Microsoft Foundry portal, locate the agent you want to connect.
- Publish the agent.
- Copy the Azure AI Project Endpoint for the agent's project.
- Copy the agent's Agent ID (the agent's name).
Add a connected agent
Sign in to Copilot Studio.
Open the primary agent you want to add a connected agent to.
On the Build tab, select the primary agent's card to open its configuration panel.
In the components panel, select Connected agents to open the Add a connected agent dialog.
Select the connection to use for Microsoft Foundry, or create a new connection by providing the Foundry project endpoint URL in the format
https://{account-name}.services.ai.azure.com/api/projects/{project-name}, then select Next.Enter a Name and Description for the connected agent. The description should explain the purpose of the Foundry agent so the orchestrator knows when to route requests to it.
Enter the Agent Id for the Microsoft Foundry agent you want to connect to.
Select Add Agent.
Confirm the connected agent appears in the components panel.
Publish your primary agent. Publishing is required so it can communicate with Azure; you don't need to deploy it to a specific channel yet. See Deploy an agent (Customer Conversation).
Caution
The model you select for the agent in Microsoft Foundry affects how long it takes to respond to a customer's question. Choose a model with response latency appropriate for your scenario, especially if the agent will be published to a voice channel.