Task Budget

Simple Definition

A task budget is the expected tokens, cost, time, model calls, tool calls, retries, and human review effort a task will need, estimated before the work starts rather than discovered after the invoice arrives.

Why It Matters

Agent work isn’t one predictable prompt, it’s a chain of steps that can grow if the agent hits friction. Setting a task budget up front gives you a low, expected, and high range to plan against, and a trigger point: if actual usage is tracking well past the high estimate, that’s a signal to check in rather than let the task run unchecked.

What Goes Into a Task Budget

Context and input size
Expected output size
Likely number of tool calls
Expected agent steps and realistic retries
Human review time

Example

Before assigning a coding agent to fix a bug, a developer budgets: moderate context (the relevant files), a couple of tool calls (search, run tests), one likely retry if the first attempt doesn’t pass, and a real code review before merging. If the agent blows well past that budget without a clear reason, that’s the cue to step in.