# Will Agent Resource Registries ever have their moment, the way AI gateways did?

> Source: <https://agenticresourcediscovery.org/>
> Published: 2026-11-01 11:39:35+00:00

# Agentic Resource Discovery Specification[¶](#agentic-resource-discovery-specification)

ARD is an open discovery protocol for agentic resources ([GitHub](https://github.com/ards-project/ard-spec)). It allows an AI client to ask: *"What is available for this task?"* and lets a discovery service answer with matching resources.

ARD sits entirely before invocation. It helps the client find the right resource; the resource is then invoked through its own native mechanism.

## What is an agentic resource?[¶](#what-is-an-agentic-resource)

An agentic resource is any external capability an AI client can call on to do a task — an agent, MCP server, Skill, Canvas, Plugin, API, or workflow — anything that can be described as an [ARD entry](glossary/#ard-entry).

## What ARD is not[¶](#what-ard-is-not)

**It is not an execution runtime:** ARD is not MCP, A2A, Skills, AI Catalog, or an API runtime, and it does not replace them.

**It is not a central catalog:** There will be many discovery services, each indexing different resources, serving different communities, and applying its own trust, ranking, and access policies. Every enterprise can run its own — much like an intranet has its own search engine over internal content. And on the public web there will be many, some optimizing for quality and trust, others for coverage.

## Who is behind ARD?[¶](#who-is-behind-ard)

ARD is being developed by a working group with participants from Microsoft, Google, Hugging Face, GoDaddy, and others. This work is part of a broader effort to create an open discovery layer for resources that AIs can draw on.

To understand the motivation and design, start with the [Introduction](introduction/).

## Open Source & License[¶](#open-source-license)

Agentic Resource Discovery (ARD) and its resources are licensed under the [Apache License 2.0](https://github.com/ards-project/docs/blob/main/LICENSE) and welcomes contributions from the community.