Repo Agents Limited info

microsoft/ai-agents-for-beginners

A Microsoft course of 18 lessons on building AI agents, with written lessons, videos and Python samples using Microsoft Agent Framework and Microsoft Foundry.

  • 76.8k GitHub stars
  • Jupyter Notebook
  • ⚖️ MIT
  • 🎯 Beginner
View on GitHub (opens in a new tab) Setup guide
microsoft/ai-agents-for-beginners preview image

What it is

AI Agents for Beginners is a course that teaches what you need to start building AI agents. Each lesson covers its own topic, with a written README and, for many lessons, a short video. Code samples are Python and use Microsoft Agent Framework with Microsoft Foundry Agent Service V2. The lessons run from agent basics and design patterns to production, protocols, memory, local agents and security.

Who it's for

  • Developers new to building AI agents
  • Learners who want a lesson-by-lesson course with videos and code samples
  • Developers working with Microsoft Agent Framework and Microsoft Foundry

Requirements

Requirements

  • Azure account (required for Microsoft Foundry)
  • Fork of the repo to run the code (recommended in the README)
  • Microsoft Agent Framework and Microsoft Foundry Agent Service V2, which the code examples use
  • Optionally, an OpenAI-compatible provider such as MiniMax, which some samples support (see Course Setup)

Setup

  1. Clone without translations (Bash / macOS / Linux)

    The repo includes 50+ language translations, which increases download size. Use sparse checkout to skip them.

    bash
    git clone --filter=blob:none --sparse https://github.com/microsoft/ai-agents-for-beginners.git
cd ai-agents-for-beginners
git sparse-checkout set --no-cone '/*' '!translations' '!translated_images'

  2. Clone without translations (Windows CMD)

    Same sparse checkout for the Windows command prompt.

    cmd
    git clone --filter=blob:none --sparse https://github.com/microsoft/ai-agents-for-beginners.git
cd ai-agents-for-beginners
git sparse-checkout set --no-cone "/*" "!translations" "!translated_images"

Pros & cons

Pros

  • Pro:Covers a broad range of topics in 18 lessons, including tool use, agentic RAG, planning, multi-agent, memory, deployment and security
  • Pro:Each lesson has a written README and Python code samples, and many also have a short video
  • Pro:Available in 50+ languages through automated translations
  • Pro:Has a Discord community for questions, and lessons can be taken in any order

Cons

  • Con:Code samples are built around Microsoft Agent Framework and Microsoft Foundry, and an Azure account is required
  • Con:Lessons 14 to 18 have no video listed in the lesson table
  • Con:Cloning the full repo is large because of the translations, so sparse checkout is recommended

Images

microsoft/ai-agents-for-beginners preview image
microsoft/ai-agents-for-beginners preview image · microsoft/ai-agents-for-beginners on GitHub · MIT
microsoft/ai-agents-for-beginners preview image