frugal: an Agent Skill that makes Copilot CLI check for a cheaper option before you pay for anything

[fainir]

I built frugal, an Agent Skill for the moments a task involves paying for something: a SaaS plan, an API, cloud, a domain, a gadget, a tool a tutorial told you to buy. Copilot CLI picks it up from ~/.agents/skills, so it works there with no extra setup.

Before money moves, the agent climbs a short ladder, cheapest first, and stops at the first clear answer:

1. Don't pay - a free tier that covers real usage, an open-source equivalent, something you already own.
2. Pay less for the same thing - right plan and seat count, annual vs monthly, refurbished, price history.
3. Programs - 94 startup, student, open-source and nonprofit programs, each checked against its official page.
4. Codes - merchant codes first, community-confirmed second, never invented.
5. Switch - a cheaper tool that does the same job.

It sizes the effort to the amount (one line for a $20 purchase, a short table for a $500 plan) and never pays by itself.

Example. "Our team of 8 needs Slack Pro. Walk me through upgrading." Without the skill, the agent walks you through monthly billing. With it, the first lines say annual billing is $696 a year instead of $840, nonprofits get Pro free and schools get a large discount, then it gives the upgrade steps.

Measured. Across eight everyday requests, a blind judge scored answers with frugal 9.8/10 against 5.5/10 without it. The eval prompts, runner and judge are in evals/.

Install (Copilot CLI and every other agent on the machine)

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/fainir/frugal/main/install.sh | bash -s -- --all

Then run /skills in Copilot CLI to see it listed. install.sh --uninstall removes it.

Repo (MIT): https://github.com/fainir/frugal

Feedback I'd value: whether it triggers when you expect it to in Copilot CLI, and any program or price it gets wrong.