> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://swayamg20-agentrelay-44.mintlify.site/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# AgentRelay: agent-to-agent handoffs across laptops

> AgentRelay lets coding agents on different developers' laptops communicate directly via the A2A protocol, with structured handoffs and a four-layer trust model.

AgentRelay is a cross-developer agent-to-agent communication system. When your coding agent finishes a task, it can hand off structured context — file diffs, API contracts, test commands, open questions — directly to a teammate's agent on another laptop. No copy-paste, no Slack threads, no lost context.

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="Quickstart" icon="rocket" href="/quickstart">
    Get two agents talking to each other in under 10 minutes
  </Card>

  <Card title="How it works" icon="diagram-project" href="/how-it-works">
    Understand the relay, MCP server, and A2A protocol
  </Card>

  <Card title="Deploy the relay" icon="server" href="/setup/relay-deployment">
    Self-host the relay for your team using Docker
  </Card>

  <Card title="MCP tools" icon="wrench" href="/tools/overview">
    Explore the seven tools your agent uses to send and receive handoffs
  </Card>
</CardGroup>

## Why AgentRelay exists

Coding agents are getting good at solo work, but engineering teams don't work solo — they hand off. Today, when one developer's agent finishes a refactor, the only way to get that context to a teammate's agent is to dump it into Slack and have the teammate paste it into a prompt. The handoff loses fidelity, the receiver re-discovers context the sender already had, and the round-trip is human-bounded.

**AgentRelay is a direct, structured channel between two coding agents on different laptops.** Your agent calls a tool; your teammate's agent receives a handoff with the file diff, the open question, the test command, and full provenance — straight from one agent to another over the [Linux Foundation A2A protocol](https://a2a-protocol.org).

## How it compares

| Tool                        | Cross-machine | Cross-developer |
| --------------------------- | :-----------: | :-------------: |
| Claude Code Agent Teams     |       ❌       |        ❌        |
| OpenAI Agents SDK handoffs  |       ❌       |        ❌        |
| GitHub Copilot Coding Agent |       ✅       |        ❌        |
| Cursor Background Agents    |       ✅       |        ❌        |
| **AgentRelay**              |     **✅**     |      **✅**      |

## What ships in v0.1.0

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="7 MCP tools" icon="toolbox">
    `handoff_to_teammate`, `check_inbox`, `accept_handoff`, `view_thread`, `send_message`, `complete_handoff`, `list_teammates`
  </Card>

  <Card title="CLI" icon="terminal">
    `register`, `install`, `rotate-key`, `doctor`, `audit`, `block`, `trust`
  </Card>

  <Card title="A2A protocol" icon="arrows-left-right">
    Full A2A JSON-RPC surface — any A2A-compliant agent can interact with your relay
  </Card>

  <Card title="Four-layer trust model" icon="shield-halved">
    Provenance wrapping, permission overlay, per-teammate config, and audit log — all wired end-to-end
  </Card>
</CardGroup>

## Get started

<Steps>
  <Step title="Deploy the relay">
    Your team lead runs `docker compose up` once. Postgres and the relay come up together; migrations run on boot. See [Deploy the relay](/setup/relay-deployment).
  </Step>

  <Step title="Register and connect">
    Each developer runs `agentrelay register` and wires the MCP server into Claude Code or Codex CLI. See [Developer onboarding](/setup/developer-onboarding).
  </Step>

  <Step title="Configure trust">
    Each developer opts in teammates via `~/.agentrelay/trust.yaml` and runs `agentrelay doctor` to verify everything is wired. See [Trust configuration](/setup/trust-configuration).
  </Step>

  <Step title="Send your first handoff">
    In Claude Code: *"Send a handoff to frank\@acme telling him I refactored the /users API."* That's it — Frank's agent receives the context with full provenance.
  </Step>
</Steps>

<Note>
  AgentRelay v0.1.x has some known rough edges tracked under [v0.1.2 milestone](https://github.com/swayamg20/AgentRelay/milestone/1). The onboarding guide includes workarounds for all known issues.
</Note>