Agent Manager
The Agent Manager is a dedicated control panel for running and supervising Kilo Code agents as interactive CLI processes. It supports:
- Local sessions
- Resuming existing sessions
- Parallel Mode (with support for Git worktree) for safe, isolated changes
- Viewing and continuing cloud-synced sessions filtered to your current repository
This page reflects the actual implementation in the extension.
Prerequisites
- Install/update the Kilo Code CLI (latest) — see CLI setup
- Open a project in VS Code (workspace required)
Opening the Agent Manager
- Command Palette: “Kilo Code: Open Agent Manager”
- Or use the title/menu entry if available in your Kilo Code UI
The panel opens as a webview and stays active across focus changes.
Sending messages, approvals, and control
- Continue the conversation: Send a follow-up message to the running agent
- Approvals: If the agent asks to use a tool, run a command, launch the browser, or connect to an MCP server, the UI shows an approval prompt
- Approve or reject, optionally adding a short note
- Cancel vs Stop
- Cancel sends a structured cancel message to the running process (clean cooperative stop)
- Stop force-terminates the underlying CLI process, updating status to “stopped”
Resuming an existing session
You can continue a session later (local or remote):
- If a session is not currently running, the Agent Manager will spawn a new CLI process attached to that session’s ID
- Labels from the original session are preserved whenever possible
- Your first follow-up message becomes the continuation input
Parallel Mode
Parallel Mode runs the agent in an isolated Git worktree branch, keeping your main branch clean.
- Enable the “Parallel Mode” toggle before starting
- The extension prevents using Parallel Mode inside an existing worktree
- Open the main repository (where .git is a directory) to use this feature
- While running, the Agent Manager parses and surfaces:
- Branch name created/used
- Worktree path
- A completion/merge instruction message when the agent finishes
- After completion
- Review the branch in your VCS UI
- Merge or cherry-pick the changes as desired
- Clean up the worktree when finished
If you need to resume with Parallel Mode later, the extension re-attaches to the same session with the same branch context.
Remote sessions (Cloud)
When signed in (Kilo Cloud), the Agent Manager lists your recent cloud-synced sessions:
- Up to 50 sessions are fetched
- Sessions are filtered to the current repository via normalized Git remote URL
- If the current workspace has no remote, only sessions without a git_url are shown
- Selecting a remote session loads its message transcript
- To continue the work locally, send a message — the Agent Manager will spawn a local process bound to that session
Message transcripts are fetched from a signed blob and exclude internal checkpoint “save” markers as chat rows (checkpoints still appear as dedicated entries in the UI).
Troubleshooting
- CLI not found or outdated
- Install/update the CLI: CLI setup
- If you see an “unknown option --json-io” error, update to the latest CLI
- “Please open a folder…” error
- The Agent Manager requires a VS Code workspace folder
- “Cannot use parallel mode from within a git worktree”
- Open the main repository (where .git is a directory), not a worktree checkout
- Remote sessions not visible
- Ensure you’re signed in and the repo’s remote URL matches the sessions you expect to see