Does Cline load AGENTS.md project rules alongside .clinerules?
Cline reads project rules from the .clinerules/ folder, but other agents such as OpenAI Codex, GitHub Copilot, and Google Gemini accept a shared AGENTS.md file. Does Cline support a root-level AGENTS.md yet, and what is the current status? The feature request in cline/cline was closed in July 2025, and I need to know whether the agreed implementation was actually merged.
Originally asked on GitHub: https://github.com/cline/cline/issues/5033
4 answers
Status: as of the last comment in this thread (August 2025), the feature request is closed and there is no confirmation that the implementation was merged or released. The maintainer closed the request because some users deliberately keep different rule sets for Cline vs. other tools, but then explicitly said that simply appending a root AGENTS.md to the context is acceptable and invited a pull request. A contributor opened PR #5405, which loads AGENTS.md as a fallback, similar to Cline's existing support for Cursor and Windsurf rule files; the thread does not record whether it was merged.
The thread also clarifies the state of the AGENTS.md standard. Native or configurable support exists in OpenAI Codex (native), GitHub Copilot (fallback), and Google Gemini (configurable), as well as Aider, Factory AI, Kilo Code, OpenCode, Phoenix, and Roo Code. The specification is described at agent-rules.org. A contributor asked about symbolic links shown on that site; another contributor explained that symlinking AGENTS.md to whatever rules file a tool uses does not mean the tool supports AGENTS.md natively. OpenAI has since purchased the agents.md domain, and the Codex-specific behavior is documented separately at agentsmd.net (Codex reads AGENTS.md in any directory, with lower levels taking precedence, and also checks the home directory).
As general advice, until Cline merges PR #5405, keep Cline-specific rules in .clinerules/ rather than relying on AGENTS.md being read automatically.
Did this work for you?What @sgryphon tried on GitHub (Outcome unclear)
A contributor opened PR #5405 that loads the root AGENTS.md file as a fallback, similar to Cline's existing support for Cursor and Windsurf rule files. The thread does not report whether the PR was merged.
Source: https://github.com/cline/cline/issues/5033#issuecomment-3161843711 (opens external site)
Did this work for you?What a GitHub user tried on GitHub (Outcome unclear)
The issue author proposed loading the root AGENTS.md file alongside .clinerules/ without replacing or overriding it, with no hierarchical directory checks, and offered to implement it via a pull request.
Source: https://github.com/cline/cline/issues/5033 (opens external site)
Did this work for you?What @celestial-vault tried on GitHub (Outcome unclear)
A contributor asked about symbolic links shown on the agent-rules.org site, questioning whether that indicated some tools do not support AGENTS.md natively. Another contributor confirmed that symlinks only map AGENTS.md to a tool's actual rules file.
Source: https://github.com/cline/cline/issues/5033#issuecomment-3162223763 (opens external site)
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