DESCRIBE AGENT

Describes the properties of a Cortex Agent.

DESCRIBE can be abbreviated to DESC.

See also:

CREATE AGENT, DROP AGENT, SHOW AGENTS

Syntax

{ DESC | DESCRIBE } AGENT <name>
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Parameters

name

Specifies the name for the agent to describe.

If the identifier contains spaces or special characters, the entire string must be enclosed in double quotes. Identifiers enclosed in double quotes are also case-sensitive.

For more information, see Identifier requirements.

Output

The command output provides Cortex Agent properties and metadata in the following columns:

Column

Description

name

Name of the agent.

database_name

Database containing the agent.

schema_name

Schema containing the agent.

owner

Owner role of the agent.

comment

Comment text for the agent.

profile

Agent profile JSON (display_name, avatar, color).

agent_spec

Complete YAML specification of the agent.

created_on

Timestamp when the agent was created.

Access control requirements

A role used to execute this SQL command must have at least one of the following privileges at a minimum:

Privilege

Object

Notes

Any one of these privileges: OWNERSHIP, USAGE, MONITOR or OPERATE

Agent

The USAGE privilege on the parent database and schema are required to perform operations on any object in a schema. Note that a role granted any privilege on a schema allows that role to resolve the schema. For example, a role granted CREATE privilege on a schema can create objects on that schema without also having USAGE granted on that schema.

For instructions on creating a custom role with a specified set of privileges, see Creating custom roles.

For general information about roles and privilege grants for performing SQL actions on securable objects, see Overview of Access Control.

Usage notes

  • To post-process the output of this command, you can use the pipe operator (->>) or the RESULT_SCAN function. Both constructs treat the output as a result set that you can query.

    The output column names for this command are generated in lowercase. If you consume a result set from this command with the pipe operator or the RESULT_SCAN function, use double-quoted identifiers for the column names in the query to ensure that they match the column names in the output that was scanned. For example, if the name of an output column is type, then specify "type" for the identifier.

Examples

Describe a Cortex Agent named MY_AGENT1 in the TEST_DATABASE database and TEST_SCHEMA schema:

DESCRIBE AGENT mydb.myschema.my_agent;
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The statement in the example prints the following output:

+--------------+---------+---------------+-------------+-----------+-----------------------+-------------------------------------+
| name  | database_name | schema_name | owner     | comment          | profile                            | agent_spec                       | created_on         |
|--------------+---------+---------------+-------------+-----------+-----------------------+-------------------------------------|
|| TEST_AGENT | EXAMPLE_DB   | AGENTS | TEST_ROLE | null | {"display_name":"test"} | "{\"models\":{\"orchestration\":\"llama3.1-70B\"},\"nested\":{\"key\":\"value\"}},\"orchestration\":{\"budget\":{\"seconds\":30,\"tokens\":16000}},\"instructions\":{\"response\":\"You will respond in a friendly but concise manner\",\"orchestration\":\"For any revenue question use Analyst; for policy use Search\",\"system\":\"You are a friendly agent.\",\"sample_questions\":[{\"question\":\"question 1\"},{\"question\":\"question 2\"},{\"question\":\"question 3\"}]},\"tools\":[{\"tool_spec\":{\"type\":\"cortex_analyst_text_to_sql\",\"name\":\"Analyst1\",\"description\":\"test\"}},{\"tool_spec\":{\"type\":\"cortex_analyst_sql_exec\",\"name\":\"SQL_exec1\"}},{\"tool_spec\":{\"type\":\"cortex_search\",\"name\":\"Search1\"}},{\"tool_spec\":{\"type\":\"web_search\",\"name\":\"web_search_1\"}},{\"tool_spec\":{\"type\":\"generic\",\"name\":\"get_weather\",\"input_schema\":{\"type\":\"object\",\"properties\":{\"location\":{\"type\":\"string\",\"description\":\"The city and state\"}},\"required\":[\"Location\"]}}}],\"tool_unable_to_answer\":\"I don't know the answer to that\",\"tool_resources\":{\"Analyst1\":{\"semantic_model_file\":\"stage1\"},\"Analyst2\":{\"semantic_view\":\"db.schema.semantic_view\"},\"Search1\":{\"name\":\"db.schema.service_name\",\"Max_results\":\"5\",\"filter\":{\"@eq\":{\"region\":\"North America\"}},\"Title_column\":\"<title_name>\",\"ID_column\":\"<column_name>\"},\"SQL_exec1\":{\"Name\":\"my_warehouse\",\"Timeout\":\"30\",\"AutoExecute\":\"true\"},\"web_search\":{\"name\":\"web_search_1\",\"Function\":\"db/schema/search_web\"}}}" | 2025-09-15 17:04:37.263 +0000 |
+--------------+---------+---------------+-------------+-----------+-----------------------+-------------------------------------+

The following example describes an agent in the current schema:

DESCRIBE AGENT my_agent;
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The following example describes the agent as a resource in JSON format:

DESCRIBE AS RESOURCE AGENT my_agent;
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Language: English