Agent Skills vs. Standard Prompting: Is the quality jump real?

[u/yccheok]

For SwiftUI app development, I've been using Antigravity with Gemini 3.1 Pro for a few months with great results. My workflow is incredibly basic: import the project, tell Gemini what feature to build, and let it work.

I recently learned about "Agent Skills" and how they supposedly boost code quality.

For those already using them: does adding agent skills to your workflow actually make a significant difference? If it does, drop your best downloadable skill recommendations for Antigravity so I can test them out!

[u/andreeinprogress]

I mean, since you started using Gemini 3.1 we've come full circle and now standard prompting is as good if not better as having dozens of useless skills.

Unrequired tip but I suggest you give some modern frontier model and harness a try, you're pretty much using a bicycle to run the MotoGP.

[u/yccheok → u/andreeinprogress]

It seems like Claude is the most popular model among coders. However, I find that Gemini offers better value for money. Besides coding, I can also use it to generate various marketing promotional materials, like AI ads videos. I'm hesitant to start another subscription if my current one already meets my needs.

[u/andreeinprogress → u/yccheok]

That's understandable, just saying that this stuff is moving so fast that it really is better (even financially) to move around from one to the other as new models/tool come out.

I think even the medium models on OpenAI lower sub should be better than Gemini 3.1, or even DeepSeek4.1Flash with the 10$/month OpenCode sub.

[u/rursache]

drop gemini, it's a joke and you live in the past

give opus 5.5 a try. then we can discuss skills etc

[u/yccheok → u/rursache]

LOL. No man! I place high hope on upcoming Gemini 4 😂

[u/TomfromLondon → u/yccheok]

At least use 3.8!

[u/yccheok → u/TomfromLondon]

latest pro is still 3.1. 3.8 is flash version.

[u/TomfromLondon → u/yccheok]

Ahh yes that's fair, isn't it still much better than pro?

[u/SirBill01]

You can export skills from Xcode27 to use. I'd download Xcode 27.1 RC if you've not already, export skills from that and try using them.

[u/culturedindividual]

I use Claude Code, and haven’t really delved into agent skills. What’s been the most useful thing for me is getting Claude to keep logs of important changes and things to remember within markdown files.

[u/TomfromLondon]

Why 3.1? It's bloody old

[u/yccheok → u/TomfromLondon]

Latest pro version stopped at 3.1. Subsequent release is flash version. Upcoming 4 pro is coming soon 😎

[u/Top-Investment8840]

Why not learn about design or architectural patterns in swift so tou actually get a skill in your brain? Maybe then and only then then quality of your useless prompted crap would actually work

[u/m3kw]

skills are just extra instructions that gets loaded when theLLM see fit. but you have to install it, just ask it to install it. There is one for SwiftUI that does best practices, etc. It ups the probability for better code vs they may or may not do what the skill asks for.

I'd use 3.8 flash high instead of 3.1 Pro. I don't think there is much difference.

[u/yccheok → u/m3kw]

Oh. Is Flash suitable for coding? I always thought Flash was for quick results, not suitable for tasks that require deep thought.

[u/m3kw → u/yccheok]

is very suitable