Agent skill · software engineering · sickn33
n8n-subworkflows
Build reusable n8n sub-workflows with typed inputs, all-vs-each execution, discoverable naming, and agent-tool exposure.
Why this skill is useful
Adds reusable n8n sub-workflow patterns and best practices for defining typed inputs and outputs that the AI wouldn't reliably generate on its own.
What it needs
About 12k tokens when loaded. Last updated 2026-08-07. 44,571 stars on the source repository.
What this skill does
n8n Sub-workflows When to Use Use this skill when shared or multi-step logic should become a typed reusable workflow, when an existing workflow is growing difficult to reason about, or when an agent needs a workflow exposed as a tool. Preserve authentication and authorization boundaries when extracting logic. Do not place credentials in inputs or returned data, declare state-changing behavior explicitly, and ask before running or activating a sub-workflow that sends, writes, deletes, or calls a billable external service. A sub-workflow is a reusable function. An Execute Workflow Trigger declares typed inputs, the body does the work, and the last node returns the output. A caller invokes it through an Execute Workflow node like any other step. That framing buys you the things functions buy you everywhere: encapsulation, reuse, testability, replaceability. It's the primary reuse mechanism in n8n, and it's badly underused. Without it, the same logic gets copy-pasted across workflows — then a bug gets fixed in two places, the third copy gets missed, and your "identical" copies quietly drift apart. This skill is about when to reach for a sub-workflow, how to define its input/output contract so callers (and agents) can actually use it, how to call it correctly (all vs each, blocking vs fire-and-forget), and how to name it so it gets found instead of rebuilt. --- The two non-negotiables Everything else is judgement. These two are not. 1. Search before you build Before you write logic for a generic problem, check whether a sub-workflow already does it. The community MCP can't filter workflows by tag, so the name is the discovery surface: If something fits, use it and tell the user ("I found Subworkflow: Parse RFC2822 date — using that"). If nothing fits, build it with a discoverable name so the next search finds it. The discovery convention (verb-first prefixes) lives in references/NAMINGANDDISCOVERY.md. 2. …
How to use it
Reference it in AdaL, Claude Code, Cursor or any coding agent — nothing to install:
@skills sickn33/n8n-subworkflows--d66eac