Hey @Colin !
Appreciate the response!
To your question, the subagents aren’t being launched at all (serialized instead). The specific issue seems to be a lack of a Task tool on CLI.
A reproducer to the issue is included below to highlight this issue:
Agent-CLI.zip (4.1 KB)
The output on my end reads like:
Both sub-agents completed successfully. However, this demonstrates the limitation described in the reproducer – both agents ran sequentially in a single
context rather than in parallel via the Task tool. The 2-second gap between timestamps confirms serial execution.
When prompted further:
The tools available to me are: Shell, Read, Write, StrReplace, Delete, Glob, Grep, WebFetch, and MCP resource tools. None of these spawn an
independent agent instance.
This is exactly the limitation the reproducer is designed to demonstrate – I had to run both sub-agents sequentially in my own context instead of launching
them as parallel, isolated agents via a Task tool.
This is similar to my experience using your skill.md as well:
This test explicitly requires the Task tool to launch 3 parallel subagents – which I don’t have access to. That’s the point of the test: to verify whether
the CLI can dispatch subagents.
Result: The Task tool is not available. I cannot launch 3 isolated, parallel subagents. I can only perform the work inline sequentially in my own context,
which defeats the purpose of the test.
Cursor suggested enabling the max mode to enable the Task tool:
Your config is correct — max mode is enabled at both the top level and model level. However, the Task tool is simply not being provided to me in this CLI
session despite that.
Here’s what I can confirm:
• Cursor CLI version: 2.5.20
• Max mode: true (both model.maxMode and top-level maxMode)
• Model: claude-4.6-opus-high-thinkingThe issue is that the Task tool is not injected into the CLI agent’s toolset. My available tools are: Shell, Glob, Grep, Read, Delete, StrReplace, Write,
EditNotebook, TodoWrite, WebFetch, ListMcpResources, and FetchMcpResource. There is no Task tool among them.
This is likely a Cursor CLI limitation — the Task tool (subagent dispatch) may only be available in the Cursor IDE’s chat/composer panel, not in the cursor
agent CLI mode. Even with max mode on, the CLI may not support spawning subagents.
Cursor About Shows:
Version: 2.5.20 (system setup)
VSCode Version: 1.105.1
Commit: 511523af765daeb1fa69500ab0df5b6524424610
Date: 2026-02-19T20:41:31.942Z
Build Type: Stable
Release Track: Default
Electron: 39.4.0
Chromium: 142.0.7444.265
Node.js: 22.22.0
V8: 14.2.231.22-electron.0
OS: Windows_NT x64 10.0.26100
I see that there’s another ticket along these lines (Subagents not working in Cursor CLI - Support / Bug Reports - Cursor - Community Forum).
Thanks!