Working with subagents
Fan out reading and mechanical work; keep the main context for decisions.
3 min
Why they are cheaper
A subagent runs in a fresh, small context and returns only its report. Ten files read by a subagent cost ten file-reads once; the same ten files read in the main session are re-read on every later turn.
How to brief one
State the goal, the files or directories in scope, what a finished answer looks like, and the model to use. Ask for a conclusion, not a dump. Run independent subagents in parallel.
See how much this one is costing you:
npx readyclaw scan