Models

Models are the AI brains behind your agents. docker-agent supports multiple providers and flexible configuration.

Inline vs. Named Models

There are two ways to assign a model to an agent:

Inline (Quick)

Use the provider/model shorthand directly in the agent definition:

agents:
  root:
    model: openai/gpt-5
    instruction: You are a helpful assistant.

Named (Full Control)

Define models in a models section and reference them by name:

models:
  claude:
    provider: anthropic
    model: claude-sonnet-4-5
    max_tokens: 64000
    temperature: 0.7

agents:
  root:
    model: claude
    instruction: You are a helpful assistant.

Named models let you configure temperature, token limits, thinking budgets, and other parameters. They're also reusable across multiple agents.

First Available Models

A named model can also select the first usable model from a priority list. This is useful for shared configs that should prefer paid cloud models when their API keys are present, but still work with a local fallback:

models:
  smart:
    first_available:
      - anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-5
      - openai/gpt-5
      - dmr/ai/qwen3

agents:
  root:
    model: smart
    instruction: You are a helpful assistant.

At load time, docker-agent selects the first candidate whose credentials are configured. You only need credentials for one candidate. See Model Configuration for details.

Supported Providers

See the Model Providers section for detailed configuration guides.

Model Properties

Reasoning / Thinking Budget

Control how much the model "thinks" before responding:

models:
  deep-thinker:
    provider: anthropic
    model: claude-sonnet-4-5
    thinking_budget: 16384

  fast-responder:
    provider: openai
    model: gpt-5
    thinking_budget: none # disable thinking

Note

Multi-provider teams

Different agents can use different providers in the same config. See Multi-Agent for patterns.

Alloy Models

"Alloy models" let you use more than one model in the same conversation — docker-agent alternates between them to leverage the strengths of each:

agents:
  root:
    model: anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-5,openai/gpt-5
    instruction: You are a helpful assistant.

Read more about the alloy model concept at xbow.com/blog/alloy-agents.