Five agent types

From reflex to autonomy. Most teams stop at "rule-based". SPM clients usually need the top three layers wired in.

L5 · autonomous

Autonomous

Owns goals end-to-end. Spawns sub-agents, reflects on results, recovers from failure.

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L4 · multi-agent

Multi-agent

Specialist agents coordinated by an orchestrator. Build, review, security, deploy.

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L3 · planner

Planner

Builds a multi-step plan, executes tools in sequence, checks each result.

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L2 · rule-based

Rule-based

If-this-then-that with an LLM in the middle. Most "AI" products live here.

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L1 · reactive

Reactive

One prompt, one response. No state, no plan, no tools — a chatbot.

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