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Install Your First Agent

Now that you have used Dexto to build your own agent, let's explore some of the in-built agents that come with Dexto.

1. List available Agents​

Dexto comes shipped with in-built agents for common use-cases.

Use the list-agents command to list the in-built agents.

dexto list-agents

You will see many different agents. Some of the available agents are:

  • Nano Banana Agent – Advanced image generation and editing using Google's Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image)
  • Podcast Agent – Advanced podcast generation using Google Gemini TTS for multi-speaker audio content
  • Database Agent – Demo agent for SQL queries and database operations
  • Image Editor Agent – Image editing and manipulation
  • Music Agent – Music creation and audio processing
  • PDF Agent – Document analysis and conversation
  • Product Researcher – Product naming and branding research
  • Triage Agent – Demo multi-agent customer support routing system

Each agent is pre-configured with the right tools, prompts, and LLM settings for its domain.

No setup required — just install and start using them.

2. Install a new agent​

dexto install music-agent

This will install the music-agent with your preferred LLM you chose during setup, and you can immediately start running it!

dexto list-agents

This command will verify that the agent was installed successfully.

3. Run the installed agent​

dexto --agent music-agent

With this command, you will now be talking to your newly installed music agent!

Use the /tools command to list its available tools in the CLI.

Check out Music Agent Demo and Tutorial for a full tutorial of how to use this agent.

4. Uninstall the agent​

dexto uninstall music-agent

This command uninstalls the agent.

dexto list-agents

Verify the music-agent was successfully uninstalled.

5. Reinstall the agent with in-built LLM settings​

dexto install music-agent --no-inject-preferences

The first time when you installed music-agent, Dexto automatically injected your preferred LLM you configured during setup to be the LLM for this agent.

To avoid this and use the default LLM shipped for the music-agent, use the --no-inject-preferences argument while installing the agent.

This is preferable for certain agents that work better with or require pre-set LLMs, such as the nano-banana agent, which requires gemini.

Now let's rerun the list-agents command to see the installed agents.

dexto list-agents

You will now see that the music-agent has a different LLM configuration (the default one, as opposed to your preferred one)

In case you install an agent incorrectly, or want to use the default LLM config, you can always uninstall and reinstall agents.

6. Use the dexto which command to find the path to your agent file​

dexto which music-agent

This command will show you the path to the installed music-agent so you can edit it directly if you are comfortable!

7. Update the music-agent to be your default agent​

Open the dexto preferences file:

vi ~/.dexto/preferences.yml

Update the defaultAgent from default-agent to music-agent

Before:

defaults:
  defaultAgent: default-agent

After:

defaults:
  defaultAgent: music-agent

Now re-start dexto without any arguments

dexto

Ask it "Who are you?", and you will see that instead of the default-agent, dexto is now using the music-agent!

Similarly, if you want to change the default to any other agent, just update defaultAgent to any valid agent-name!

8. Run a new agent directly without install​

dexto -a database-agent

If you don't run the install command, Dexto will automatically install the agent with your preferred LLM and start up the agent directly!

You can now chat with the database agent, or exit and re-run the list-agents command to verify that the database-agent was installed

You can use the --no-auto-install argument with dexto to disable the auto install behaviour.

Congratulations!​

You've just installed your first pre-built AI agent with Dexto and set it as your default agent!

You've learned how to:

  • ✅ List available agents in dexto with the dexto list-agents command
  • ✅ Install agents with the dexto install command
  • ✅ Uninstall agents with the dexto uninstall command
  • ✅ Use the --no-inject-preferences argument with dexto install command to use default LLM preferences.
  • ✅ Find the file path to installed agents with the dexto which command
  • ✅ Set any agent as your preferred default agent in dexto
  • ✅ Automatically install and run an agent with dexto -a <agent_name>

You are now ready to explore other in-built agents like the podcast agent, triage agent, database agent, and more!

Next Steps: Explore adding more tools or building multi-agent systems.