Background Agents are Cursor's most advanced feature. They run autonomously in the cloud, handling complex tasks while you continue working — or even while you're away from the computer.
You can run up to 8 background agents simultaneously, each working on different tasks. Use Git worktrees to give each agent its own branch and working directory, preventing conflicts.
Mission Control is a centralized dashboard for monitoring all your running agent tasks simultaneously. It displays real-time status, streaming logs, and progress indicators for every active background agent — giving you a single pane of glass into your fleet of autonomous workers.
&Prefix any Composer prompt with the & symbol to trigger a Cloud Handoff. This sends the task to a persistent cloud sandbox that continues running even after you close the IDE. It's ideal for long-running migrations, large-scale refactors, or overnight test suites. When you reopen Cursor, the results are waiting for you in Mission Control.
// Typical background agent workflow: // 1. Assign a GitHub issue to the agent // 2. Agent clones repo, creates branch // 3. Writes code, installs deps, runs tests // 4. Opens PR when all tests pass // 5. You review and merge // // Cloud Handoff example: // Type: & Refactor the auth module to use OAuth 2.1 // Close laptop, go home — agent keeps working in the cloud