Lesson 1324 of 1455
When agents get stuck in loops (and how to stop them)
Runaway loops eat your wallet — set hard limits before you press run.
Builders · Agentic AI · ~4 min read
The big idea
Agents can spin forever calling the same tool with the same input if their stop condition is fuzzy.
Some examples
- Set a max-steps limit (like 20).
- Set a max-cost limit if you're paying per call.
- Watch the first run live before walking away.
Try it!
Build any tiny agent. Set max_steps=10. Run it. Watch what happens at step 10.
Understanding "When agents get stuck in loops (and how to stop them)" in practice: AI agents don't just answer questions — they can do things, like looking things up, writing files, or talking to apps. Runaway loops eat your wallet — set hard limits before you press run — and knowing how to apply this gives you a concrete advantage.
- Design clear agent goals before adding tools
- Define permissions and scope before deploying any agent
- Build in human-approval checkpoints for high-stakes actions
- Understand when to use an agent vs. a simple chat prompt
- 1Design an agent spec: goal, tools, permissions, stop condition
- 2Run a simple web-search agent in a sandbox environment
- 3Instrument an existing workflow to identify where an agent could save time
End-of-lesson quiz
Check what stuck
8 questions · Score saves to your progress.
Lesson help
Questions are best handled with a grown-up here.
For this age range, Tendril keeps freeform AI chat paused until parent/guardian consent and child-safe moderation are fully verified. Use the quiz, notes, and related lessons below, or ask a parent, guardian, teacher, or librarian to work through the question with you.
Progress saved locally in this browser. Sign in to sync across devices.
Related lessons
Keep going
Builders · 7 min
Giving Your AI Agent a Clear Stopping Condition (or Watch It Loop Forever)
Without a 'done when X' rule, agents loop until they hit the token limit. Always set the exit.
Creators · 11 min
AI and agent failure mode catalog
Catalog the ways your agent fails — loops, hallucinated tools, scope creep — so you can mitigate each one.
Builders · 40 min
Builder Capstone: Design an Agent for Your Life
No code. Just design. Pick a real task you do every week and draft a complete agent spec — goal, tools, loop, stop, approvals, and what success looks like.