agentpolicy

AgentPolicy

Runtime policy enforcement for AI agent sessions.

AgentPolicy is an open-source Python SDK that puts explicit runtime rules around what an agent is allowed to do. It enforces budgets, tool access, network access, and approval gates in real time, with a structured audit trail for every decision.

One policy layer for agent behavior. Zero infrastructure to manage.

---

What is AgentPolicy?

Agents fail in non-deterministic ways:

• they call the wrong tool
• they hit the wrong domain
• they exceed budget
• they take an action that should require human review

AgentPolicy makes those decisions explicit and enforceable.

Each runtime action is evaluated as one of:

• allow
• deny
• require_approval

Every decision is recorded with the action, the reason, and the matched policy rule.

Budget is treated as a first-class policy. AgentPolicy uses agentbudget under the hood for spend accounting and hard budget enforcement instead of rebuilding that layer.

---

Quickstart

YAML Policy (Recommended)

Define policy once. Enforce it at runtime.

budget:
  max_spend: 5.00

tools:
  allow:
    - search_docs
    - read_file
    - send_email
  block:
    - delete_prod_db

network:
  allow:
    - docs.python.org
  block:
    - twitter.com

approval:
  require_for:
    - tool: send_email
    - cost_gt: 1.00

from agentpolicy import AgentPolicy, ApprovalRequired

policy = AgentPolicy.from_yaml("policy.yaml")

with policy.session() as session:
    session.check_tool("search_docs", cost=0.02)
    session.check_http("https://docs.python.org/3/", cost=0.01)

    try:
        session.check_tool("send_email")
    except ApprovalRequired:
        session.check_tool("send_email", approved=True)

print(session.report())

Python API

For full control, define policy directly in code.

from agentpolicy import AgentPolicy

policy = AgentPolicy(
    budget="$5.00",
    allowed_tools=["search_docs", "read_file"],
    blocked_domains=["twitter.com"],
    approval_rules=[
        {"tool": "send_email"},
        {"cost_gt": 1.00},
    ],
)

with policy.session() as session:
    session.check_tool("search_docs", cost=0.02)
    session.check_http("https://docs.python.org/3/", cost=0.01)

---

Install

pip install agentpolicy

Python 3.9+. Installs agentbudget as a dependency.

For local development:

python3 -m pip install -e .[dev]
bash scripts/run_tests.sh

---

Core API

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Policy Types

Budget Policy

policy = AgentPolicy(budget="$3.00")

Denies any action that would push the session over budget.

Tool Policy

policy = AgentPolicy(
    allowed_tools=["search_docs", "read_file"],
    blocked_tools=["delete_prod_db"],
)

Supports allowlists and explicit blocks.

Network Policy

policy = AgentPolicy(
    allowed_domains=["docs.python.org", "api.openai.com"],
    blocked_domains=["twitter.com", "facebook.com"],
)

Controls outbound HTTP access at the domain layer.

Approval Policy

policy = AgentPolicy(
    approval_rules=[
        {"tool": "send_email"},
        {"domain": "api.stripe.com"},
        {"cost_gt": 1.00},
    ]
)

Escalates sensitive actions to ApprovalRequired.

---

CLI

agentpolicy validate policy.yaml
agentpolicy explain policy.yaml
agentpolicy demo policy.yaml

The CLI is intentionally small:

• validate checks that a policy file is structurally valid
• explain prints a simple machine-readable summary
• demo runs a sample session and prints the resulting report

---

Auditability

AgentPolicy is designed to be legible under pressure.

Each decision includes:

• the action
• the decision type
• the exact reason
• the matched approval rule when escalation happens

Reports also summarize:

• decisions by type
• decisions by action category
• cost by action category
• denied tools
• denied domains
• approval-required actions

Example Report

{
    "session_id": "pol_a1b2c3d4e5f6",
    "budget": 5.0,
    "spent": 0.03,
    "remaining": 4.97,
    "decision_summary": {
        "allow": 2,
        "deny": 1,
        "require_approval": 1,
        "by_action_type": {"tool": 2, "http": 2},
    },
    "cost_summary": {
        "by_action_type": {"tool": 0.02, "http": 0.01},
    },
    "policy_hits": {
        "denied_tools": [],
        "denied_domains": ["twitter.com"],
        "approval_required": ["send_email"],
    },
    "duration_seconds": 0.14,
    "decisions": [...],
}

---

Relationship to AgentBudget

agentbudget answers:

• how much has this agent spent?
• when should execution stop on cost?

agentpolicy answers:

• what can this agent do?
• what can it access?
• what requires approval?

In practice, budget is one policy dimension inside a broader runtime control layer.

The stack is:

• agentbudget for cost accounting and hard budget enforcement
• agentpolicy for the broader runtime decision layer

---

Why it exists

Most agent tooling focuses on orchestration. AgentPolicy focuses on control.

It is a good fit for:

• internal copilots
• research agents
• workflow automation
• production agent backends

---

Philosophy

AgentPolicy is deliberately small.

It is not a dashboard. It is not a hosted compliance product. It is not an orchestration framework.

It is a runtime primitive for making agent behavior explicit and enforceable.

---

Status

Early, but real.

The first version covers the four policy types that matter most in practice:

• spend
• tools
• network
• approval

That is enough to protect a surprising amount of real agent behavior without adding operational complexity.