Prompty is a markdown-based file format and toolkit for writing, running, managing, and evaluating prompts used by large language model applications. Developers can run the same prompt files from Python, TypeScript, or VS Code and connect them to OpenAI-compatible endpoints. Its catalogue instruction helps coding agents work with Prompty files and tooling.
Borrowing it
Nothing to install: this file belongs to microsoft/prompty. Take a copy, put it at the same path in your own repository, and replace the rules that are about this project with yours.
curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/microsoft/prompty/main/.github/copilot-instructions.mdgit clone --depth 1 https://github.com/microsoft/promptyWrote this? Show the measurements
A badge with what this costs and how it scanned, read live from this page, so it follows the numbers instead of freezing them. Markdown for a README, HTML for a documentation site or a project page.
[](https://agentmods.dev/instructions/microsoft/prompty/copilot-instructions)<a href="https://agentmods.dev/instructions/microsoft/prompty/copilot-instructions"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/instructions/microsoft/prompty/copilot-instructions/github.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>Or the 80×15 button, for a site that already has a row of RSS and ATOM ones. Only the verdict fits; the numbers stay here.
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/instructions/microsoft/prompty/copilot-instructions"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/instructions/microsoft/prompty/copilot-instructions.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>What it costs to keep this loaded
Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.
| Model | Per session | Once invoked |
|---|---|---|
| Fable 5.1 | $0.14642 | $0.14642 |
| Opus 5.5 | $0.05857 | $0.05857 |
| Sonnet 5.5 | $0.02928 | $0.02928 |
| Haiku 4.5 | $0.01464 | $0.01464 |
Grade A, and why
prompty copilot-instructions.md scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 2mo ago.
A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.
Nothing flagged
None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.
How it starts
The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 1,450 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.
Prompty v2 — Complete Rebuild Plan
Overview
Prompty is being rebuilt from the ground up. The type system that originated in Prompty's TypeSpec specification is now owned in this repo and emitted through Typra. Prompty v2 uses the generated Prompty model packages as the canonical, lower-level type layer.
Core principle: Prompty is a markdown file format (.prompty) for LLM prompts. The frontmatter uses Prompty's Typra-generated prompt model. The markdown body becomes instructions. The runtime loads, renders, parses, and executes prompts.
What Prompty Uses from the Typra-Generated Model
Only the prompt runtime subset — not every schema contract:
| Model Type | Prompty Uses |
|---|---|
Prompty |
Yes — the loaded .prompty file becomes this |
Model |
Yes — model configuration |
Connection (all subtypes) |
Yes — auth/endpoint config |
ModelOptions |
Yes — temperature, maxOutputTokens, etc. |
Template / FormatConfig / ParserConfig |
Yes — template engine config |
Property |
Yes — inputs/outputs |
FunctionTool |
Yes — local function calling |
McpTool |
Yes — MCP server integration |
OpenApiTool |
Yes — API-based tools |
CustomTool |
Yes — wildcard * catch-all for unknown tool kinds |
Workflow |
No |
ContainerAgent |
No |
AgentManifest |
No |
WebSearchTool / FileSearchTool / CodeInterpreterTool |
No |
What this file has done since we first saw it
Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.
- 2mo ago First seen · 1,450 lines · 14,642 tokens per session scan A 056659584066
prompty copilot-instructions.md is an instructions file published in the GitHub repository microsoft/prompty (1,286 stars, last pushed 4d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 14,642 tokens to every session, about $0.0586 per session on Opus 5.5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-30.
prompty copilot-instructions.md compared with instructions from other repositories
| Mod | Type | Stars | Last push | Licence | Scan | Tokens | Works with |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| prompty copilot-instructions.mdmicrosoft/prompty | Instructions file | 1.3k | 4d ago | MIT | A | 14,642 | GitHub Copilot |
| vscode buildNext.instructions.mdmicrosoft/vscode | Instructions file | 195k | today | MIT | A | 9,719 | GitHub Copilot |
| next.js AGENTS.mdvercel/next.js | Instructions file | 143k | today | MIT | A | 7,461 | Codex, OpenCode |
| langchain AGENTS.mdlangchain-ai/langchain | Instructions file | 149k | today | MIT | A | 4,680 | Codex, OpenCode |
| vscode oss-third-party-notices.instructions.mdmicrosoft/vscode | Instructions file | 195k | today | MIT | A | 5,516 | GitHub Copilot |
| vscode copilot-instructions.mdmicrosoft/vscode | Instructions file | 195k | today | MIT | A | 3,093 | GitHub Copilot |
| deepseek-harness AGENTS.mddeepseek-ai/deepseek-harness | Instructions file | 274k | 2d ago | MIT | A | 4,313 | Codex, OpenCode |