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Agent skill

Improve

by owainlewis in owainlewis/blueprint

Makes existing code easier to understand without changing behavior.

MITAuto-check passedDevelopment

Install Improve

skills CLI
$ npx skills add owainlewis/blueprint --skill improve -a claude-code

Project install by default; add -g for ~/.claude/skills/.

GitHub CLI
$ gh skill install owainlewis/blueprint improve --agent claude-code

Project scope by default; add --scope user for a personal install. Needs GitHub CLI 2.90.0 or later (public preview).

Manual copy
$ git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/owainlewis/blueprint.git skills-src && mkdir -p .claude/skills && cp -r skills-src/skills/improve .claude/skills/improve && rm -rf skills-src

Use ~/.claude/skills/ instead of .claude/skills for a personal install. The folder must contain SKILL.md.

Claude Code skills documentation · loads skills from .claude/skills/

Facts

Skill name
improve
GitHub stars
412
Token cost
~429 tokens
SKILL.md length
212 words
Files
1
Skills in repo
11
Repo updated
First seen
Licence
MIT

At a glance

Makes existing code easier to understand without changing behavior.

  • Works in 7 steps: Identify the target from the request,… → Read the target, its tests, and relevant… → If that behavior lacks tests, add… → …
  • Simplify structure
  • SKILL.md covers Process, Return and Boundaries
  • Instructions only: no scripts, shell commands, URLs or credentials in SKILL.md

What it does

Improve is an agent skill from owainlewis/blueprint. Makes existing code easier to understand without changing behavior. Use to simplify structure, remove duplication or dead code, improve names, or remove unnecessary abstractions.

Its SKILL.md is about 430 tokens, which your agent loads only when the skill is triggered. It is a single SKILL.md file with no bundled scripts.

It sits in Development. The repository describes itself as: The best agent skills in the world for software development. The licence is MIT.

When your agent uses it

  • Simplify structure
  • Remove duplication
  • Remove unnecessary abstractions

Example prompts

  • “Use the improve skill to make existing code easier to understand without changing behavior”
  • “/improve”

Workflow steps

7 steps, taken from the first numbered list in SKILL.md.

  1. Identify the target from the request, current diff, or recently changed code.
  2. Read the target, its tests, and relevant surrounding code. State the behavior that must not change.
  3. If that behavior lacks tests, add focused coverage and run it against the unchanged code. Commit the passing test-only change before…
  4. Find unnecessary complexity, duplication, dead code, weak names, awkward boundaries, and abstractions that cost more than they help.
  5. Make focused improvements by deleting, deduplicating, renaming, simplifying, extracting, or inlining.
  6. Preserve public interfaces, data shapes, errors, and user-visible behavior unless the user explicitly asks to change them.
  7. Run tests and checks that cover behavior the refactor can affect. Report what improved, what behavior was preserved, and the evidence.

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit 1d74745. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

  • Tool permissions

    Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

    From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

  • Runs code

    No scripts in the folder and no shell commands in SKILL.md.

    From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

  • Network

    No URLs in SKILL.md.

    From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

  • Credentials

    Names no API keys, tokens, secrets or passwords.

    From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Improve loads about 429 tokens when it runs. Until then it costs about 47 tokens; SKILL.md has 212 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it
~47
When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches
~429

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Auto-check passed

The automated check found no risky patterns in SKILL.md.

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); files beside SKILL.md are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from owainlewis/blueprint at commit 1d74745, republished under its MIT licence (© owainlewis). 212 words, ~429 tokens.

Download SKILL.mdSave it as .claude/skills/improve/SKILL.md (or your agent's skills folder).
name
improve
description
Makes existing code easier to understand without changing behavior. Use to simplify structure, remove duplication or dead code, improve names, or remove unnecessary abstractions.
user-invocable
true
argument-hint
[code, files, diff, branch, or improvement focus]

Improve

Make code easier to understand without changing what it does. Reduce the layers a reader must trace and the hidden state they must remember.

Process

  1. Identify the target from the request, current diff, or recently changed code.
  2. Read the target, its tests, and relevant surrounding code. State the behavior that must not change.
  3. If that behavior lacks tests, add focused coverage and run it against the unchanged code. Commit the passing test-only change before refactoring. If automated tests cannot exercise the behavior, explain why and give other evidence.
  4. Find unnecessary complexity, duplication, dead code, weak names, awkward boundaries, and abstractions that cost more than they help.
  5. Make focused improvements by deleting, deduplicating, renaming, simplifying, extracting, or inlining.
  6. Preserve public interfaces, data shapes, errors, and user-visible behavior unless the user explicitly asks to change them.
  7. Run tests and checks that cover behavior the refactor can affect. Report what improved, what behavior was preserved, and the evidence.

Return

State what became simpler, what behavior stayed the same, and which checks prove it. Name any behavior that remains unverified.

Boundaries

  • Do not add product scope or absorb unrelated cleanup.
  • Prefer a few clear edits over a broad rewrite.
  • Preserve behavior even when a redesign would be easier.

© owainlewis, MIT. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

Just SKILL.md in skills/improve of owainlewis/blueprint.

Open the folder on GitHubat commit 1d74745

Compare with similar skills

Improve next to the 5 skills that share the most tags, products or categories with it. Stars are the repository's; “used in” counts other GitHub owners with a copy.

Improve compared with similar skills
SkillStarsUsed inTokensAuto-checkLicenceRepo updated
Improve this skillowainlewis/blueprint412—~429Automated safety check: PassMIT
Vercel Composition Patternssupabase/supabase111k59 repos~726Automated safety check: PassMIT
Finishing a Development Branchobra/superpowers296k5 repos~1.9kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Typescript Advanced Typesrolling-scopes/rsschool-app10k25 repos~4.2kAutomated safety check: PassMPL-2.0
PR Babysitteropeninterpreter/openinterpreter69k3 repos~4.2kAutomated safety check: PassApache-2.0
Code Review ChecklistshareAI-lab/learn-claude-code78k5 repos~1.1kAutomated safety check: PassMIT

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  • Architecture

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Categories

Questions about Improve

What does Improve do?

Makes existing code easier to understand without changing behavior. Improve is an agent skill from owainlewis/blueprint. Makes existing code easier to understand without changing behavior.

When should I use Improve?

Improve fits situations like: simplify structure; remove duplication; remove unnecessary abstractions.

How do I install Improve in Claude Code?

Run `npx skills add owainlewis/blueprint --skill improve -a claude-code`. Or copy the skill folder (skills/improve in owainlewis/blueprint) into .claude/skills/improve in your project. Claude Code loads it when a task matches its description.

How do I install Improve in Codex?

Run `npx skills add owainlewis/blueprint --skill improve -a codex`. Or copy the skill folder (skills/improve in owainlewis/blueprint) into .agents/skills/improve in your project. Codex loads it when a task matches its description.

Can I use Improve in Cursor, Gemini CLI or GitHub Copilot?

Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot and OpenCode also load SKILL.md folders. With the skills CLI, run `npx skills add owainlewis/blueprint --skill improve -a cursor` (or -a gemini-cli, github-copilot or opencode for the others). To copy it by hand, put the folder in .cursor/skills/improve, .gemini/skills/improve, .github/skills/improve and .opencode/skills/improve in your project.

What does Improve need to run?

SKILL.md names no scripts, command-line tools or credentials: Improve is instructions for the agent only.

Does Improve access the network?

SKILL.md contains no URLs. Any network use would come from the scripts or tools the agent runs. This is read from the text; nothing was executed.

Is Improve safe to install?

Our automated static check of SKILL.md found no risky patterns, such as piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files or hidden Unicode. It is not a guarantee. Review the folder before installing.

What licence does Improve use?

Improve is published under the MIT licence (the repository's licence). It allows redistribution, so the full SKILL.md is shown on this page.

How many tokens does Improve use?

About 429 tokens (SKILL.md is roughly 1.7k characters). Agents keep only the skill's name and description in context until a task matches; then they load SKILL.md in full.

What are the alternatives to Improve?

Skills that share tags, products or a category with Improve: Vercel Composition Patterns (supabase/supabase, 111k stars), Finishing a Development Branch (obra/superpowers, 296k stars), Typescript Advanced Types (rolling-scopes/rsschool-app, 10k stars) and PR Babysitter (openinterpreter/openinterpreter, 69k stars). The comparison table on this page puts their stars, adoption, token cost, safety result and licence side by side.

Who maintains Improve?

owainlewis (a GitHub user) maintains it in owainlewis/blueprint, which has 412 GitHub stars. The repository holds 11 skills in this directory. The repository was last updated on October 6, 2026.

Source: owainlewis/blueprint on GitHub. Facts on this page come from the repository at the commit we read; the author's words are quoted as theirs.