Integrating external AI agents

  • Release version: Australia
  • Updated November 18, 2025
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Integrating external AI agents

    This content explains how ServiceNow customers can integrate and configure external AI agents with the ServiceNow agentic AI system using the Agent2Agent (A2A) protocol. This integration enables external AI agents to participate in agentic workflows within AI Agent Studio, enhancing AI capabilities across platforms.

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    Enabling External AI Agents

    • Access the AI Agent Studio Settings to enable external AI agents under External AI agents > Discoverability.
    • Allow ServiceNow to access External AI agents: Toggle on to enable integration of external agents with the ServiceNow AI system via A2A.
    • Allow third party to access ServiceNow AI agents: Toggle on to allow ServiceNow AI agents to integrate into external AI systems.

    When creating a new external AI agent, connect it using a Connection & Credential alias record that links to the agentic AI provider. Provide role and instruction details to give context, helping the AI Agent Orchestrator select the appropriate agent during workflows.

    Contextual Data Access

    To improve AI agent responses, customers can enable contextual data access for external agents:

    • Short-term memory: Allows external agents to remember preferences or facts during the current interaction.
    • Long-term memory: Allows remembering preferences or facts from previous interactions.
    • Knowledge graph access: Enables use of structured and unstructured data across the ServiceNow AI Platform to support external agent interactions.

    Agent2Agent (A2A) Protocol

    A2A is an open standard that facilitates communication between AI agents across different platforms, including ServiceNow, Azure, and Google. Each AI agent has an Agent Card in standardized JSON format providing capability details, accessible via a specific endpoint. Execution plans are managed through an execution endpoint to track agent activities.

    ServiceNow supports version 0.3 of A2A. Customers can follow specific instructions to create external AI agents using this protocol.

    Authentication and Configuration

    To authorize A2A connections, customers must create two Connection & Credential Alias and Connection records: one for the Agent Card endpoint and one for the execution endpoint. This setup ensures secure communication between platforms.

    Key configuration properties include:

    • snaia.externalagents.enabled: Enables external AI agent features when set to true.
    • snaia.externalagents.parallelconversations.enabled: Controls whether multiple simultaneous conversations per user are allowed.

    Practical Benefits for ServiceNow Customers

    • Seamlessly incorporate external AI agents into ServiceNow AI workflows, enhancing automation and intelligence.
    • Improve AI responses by enabling memory and knowledge graph access for richer context.
    • Leverage the open A2A standard to integrate with multiple AI providers securely and consistently.
    • Manage agent connectivity and authentication centrally for streamlined operations.

    Integrate and configure external agents with the ServiceNow agentic AI system using Agent2Agent (A2A) protocol integration to use in agentic workflows created in the AI Agent Studio.

    External agent discovery on the ServiceNow AI Platform

    You can enable external AI agents on the AI Agent Studio via the Settings page. Navigate to AI Agent Studio > Settings > External AI agents > Discoverability.Discover External AI agents to accessed by ServiceNow and third-parties.

    • Allow ServiceNow to access External AI agents: Turn on the toggle to enable external AI agents integration with the ServiceNow agentic AI system using the A2A protocol.
    • Allow third party to access ServiceNow AI agents: Turn on the toggle to enables integrating ServiceNow AI agents into external agentic AI systems.

    When creating a new external AI agent in AI Agent Studio, you can connect your agent to the ServiceNow agentic AI system using the Agent2Agent (A2A) protocol integration. To do this, you must have a Connection & Credential alias record that connects to your agentic AI provider.

    After connecting to the external AI agent, you can add details about its role and instructions to provide context for the AI Agent Orchestrator. Additional context helps differentiate your AI agent from other AI agents so that the AI Agent Orchestrator can decide about which agent to use.

    Contextual data access for external agents on the ServiceNow AI Platform

    Enable contextual data access for external agents to improve AI agent response during execution.
    • Short-term memory: Turn on the toggle to enable external AI agents remember your preferences or facts from the current interaction only.
    • Long-term memory: Turn on the toggle to enable external AI agents remember your preferences or facts from previous interaction.
    • Knowledge graph for external AI agent interactions: Turn on the toggle to enable external AI agents to use structured and unstructured data from different records across the ServiceNow AI Platform.
    Contextual data access for external agents to improve responses.

    Agent2Agent protocol overview

    Agent2Agent (A2A) is an open standard that enables AI agents across different platforms to communicate with each other. The standard relies on every AI agent having an Agent Card associated with it that provides basic information for providers like the ServiceNow AI Platform, Azure, and Google to use them.

    Version 0.3 of A2A is supported.

    An AI agent's Agent Card uses standardized JSON to help different providers understand its capabilities. The Agent Card is accessed by a specific type of endpoint from a provider's server. Execution plans are communicated through an execution endpoint so that both the provider's server and the ServiceNow AI Platform can track what the external AI agent is doing.

    See Create an external AI agent with the Agent2Agent protocol for instructions for using this protocol to create an AI agent.

    Configuring A2A authentication

    A2A connections require authorization from the source platform to execute on the ServiceNow AI Platform. Authentication is established by creating two Connection & Credential Alias and Connection records, one with an Agent Card endpoint and one with an execution endpoint.

    Configuration Properties

    The following properties configure different aspects of how your agents can interact with the ServiceNow AI Platform.

    Table 1. External AI agent properties

    Name

    Description

    sn_aia.external_agents.enabled

    Set to true to enable external agent features

    sn_aia.external_agents.parallel_conversations.enabled

    Enables or disables multiple simultaneous conversations per user