Microsoft Agent Framework
Type: full-code · Vendor: Microsoft · Language: C#/.NET, Python · License: MIT · Status: active · Status in practice: emerging · First released: 2025-10
Unify Microsoft's two prior agent stacks — AutoGen's multi-agent orchestration and Semantic Kernel's enterprise plugin and connector model — into one SDK for building single- and multi-agent systems over shared abstractions for agents, tools, threads, and workflows.
Description. Microsoft Agent Framework is an open-source SDK announced in October 2025 that merges AutoGen and Semantic Kernel into a single agent stack for .NET and Python. It provides a unified agent abstraction with tool calling, multiple multi-agent orchestration shapes (sequential, concurrent, group chat, handoff), and a graph-based workflow runtime, alongside enterprise concerns — observability, approvals, and connectors — inherited from Semantic Kernel. Microsoft positions it as the successor to both predecessors, with general availability targeted for early 2026.
Agent loop shape. A unified agent abstraction over a tool-calling loop, with pluggable multi-agent orchestrators (sequential, concurrent, group chat, handoff) and a separate graph-based workflow runtime for deterministic control flow.
Primary use cases
- enterprise multi-agent applications
- .NET agent development
- tool-using assistants
- workflow orchestration
Patterns this full-code implements —
- ★★Tool Use
Agents invoke typed functions and tools as a first-class capability, carried over from Semantic Kernel's plugin/function model.
- ★★Orchestrator-Workers
Group-chat and concurrent orchestration shapes are ported from AutoGen and exposed as built-in orchestrators.
- ★Handoff
Built-in handoff orchestration transfers control between specialised agents.
- ★★Human-in-the-Loop
The workflow runtime supports approval checkpoints before consequential actions.
- ★★Reflection
Agents can run critique/refine loops, though it is not a headline orchestrator.
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Provenance
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- Verification status: stub