Context management has exactly two moves — reduce what's in the window, and delegate what doesn't need to be there — and every technique you'll ever learn is one or both.

Principle

Reduce and Delegate

The only two moves

There is no third verb.

01

Reduce

Remove it.

If a token isn't load-bearing for this task, it's noise. There is no neutral context — noise competes with signal for attention.

spectarget-fileonboarding.mdtestchangeloghistoryschemaunrelated-readme

02

Delegate

Move it somewhere else.

Needed information that isn't needed here goes to a sub-agent, hook, tool, or on-demand file — the sub-agent's whole conversation returns as one tool-call.

"find all auth callers"↓

sub-agent returns: list of 14 files

A change you can't classify as reduce or delegate isn't a context decision — it's behavior or tooling, which lives elsewhere.

Name the move before making it. Unnamed moves are the ones that quietly bloat the window.

Every technique tagged

Take any context-engineering move. Classify it.

Required readsload only what's relevant

Reduce

Progressive disclosurelean top-level + reference files

Reduce

Sub-agent researchfetch context, return summary

Delegate

Shared briefing docAGENT_SYSTEM.md etc.

ReduceDelegate

Token-saving hooksrewrite verbose commands

Reduce

Context bundlessession-scoped artifacts

Delegate

Task-scoped agentsone job, minimal context

Reduce

If a new technique appears and you can't tag it R or D, it isn't context engineering — it's something else wearing the label.

The active form

Reduce-and-delegate is a verb, not a posture.

"Search and destroy is the real skill in context engineering."

— TAC

Passive

Avoid adding

Try not to make it worse. Reactive. Every agent still starts bloated.

→

Active

Audit and strip

Before firing an agent, review the prompt. Cut everything that isn't load-bearing.

Review the prompt the same way a developer reviews code before merging. Every token earns its seat or gets cut.

Skip the audit and context silently accumulates — the agent degrades, the failure is confident, and the diagnosis is expensive.

The limit of the move

Reduce toward the sweet spot — not below it.

Context has a shape. Under-reducing pollutes. Over-reducing starves.

Starve

Sweet spot

Pollute

less contextmore context

← Over-reduced Agent is missing the file it needs. Fails confidently. The worst failure mode — undetected.

Sweet spot Every token is load-bearing. Nothing extra, nothing missing. Both moves aimed here.

Under-reduced → Noise competes with signal. Attention drifts. Output quality falls.

Reduce-and-delegate is directional, not extreme. The goal is the sweet spot — not the smallest possible context.

The discipline

Every context decision is reduce, delegate, or not a context decision.

Name the move before you make it. Audit the prompt like you'd audit a PR. Aim for the sweet spot — not the smallest window. Unnamed moves are how the context quietly rots.