> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.openhome.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Ability Types

> The four categories every OpenHome Ability falls into — Skill, Agent Controlled, Background Daemon, and Local.

Every Ability on OpenHome falls into one of four categories. Knowing which type you are building determines your architecture, your trigger strategy, and how users experience the feature.

## The four categories

| Category                                           | Behavior                                                                                                                                |
| -------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Skill**                                          | Triggered by a hotword. Runs a flow, exits. The original ability pattern.                                                               |
| **Agent Controlled**                               | The Agent decides when to invoke it — data lookups, tool use, delegated actions. No explicit trigger.                                   |
| **Background Daemon**                              | Starts automatically when a call begins and runs continuously for the whole session. Used for monitoring, alarms, ambient intelligence. |
| [**Local**](/guides/getting-started/local-ability) | Runs as a Local Ability on OpenHome DevKit hardware.                                                                                    |