AI agents without proper memory are just expensive chatbots repeating the same mistakes.
After building 50+ production agents, I discovered most developers only implement 1 out of 5 critical memory types.
Here’s the complete memory architecture powering agents at Google, Microsoft, and top AI startups:
𝗦𝗵𝗼𝗿𝘁-𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗺 𝗠𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗿𝘆 (𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗠𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗿𝘆)
→ Maintains conversation context (last 5-10 turns)
→ Enables coherent multi-turn dialogues
→ Clears after session ends
→ Implementation: Rolling buffer/context window
𝗟𝗼𝗻𝗴-𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗺 𝗠𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗿𝘆 (𝗣𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗦𝘁𝗼𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲)
Unlike short-term memory, long-term memory persists across sessions and contains three specialized subsystems:
𝟭. 𝗦𝗲𝗺𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗰 𝗠𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗿𝘆 (𝗞𝗻𝗼𝘄𝗹𝗲𝗱𝗴𝗲 𝗕𝗮𝘀𝗲)
→ Domain expertise and factual knowledge
→ Company policies, product catalogs
→ Doesn’t change per user interaction
→ Implementation: Vector DB (Pinecone/Qdrant) + RAG
𝟮. 𝗘𝗽𝗶𝘀𝗼𝗱𝗶𝗰 𝗠𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗿𝘆 (𝗘𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 𝗟𝗼𝗴𝘀)
→ Specific past interactions and outcomes
→ “Last time user tried X, Y happened”
→ Enables learning from past actions
→ Implementation: Few-shot prompting + event logs
𝟯. 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗰𝗲𝗱𝘂𝗿𝗮𝗹 𝗠𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗿𝘆 (𝗦𝗸𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗦𝗲𝘁𝘀)
→ How to execute specific workflows
→ Learned task sequences and patterns
→ Improves with repetition
→ Implementation: Function definitions + prompt templates
When processing user input, intelligent agents don’t query memories in isolation:
1️⃣ Short-term provides immediate context
2️⃣ Semantic supplies relevant domain knowledge
3️⃣ Episodic recalls similar past scenarios
4️⃣ Procedural suggests proven action sequences
This orchestrated approach enables agents to:
– Handle complex multi-step tasks autonomously
– Learn from failures without retraining
– Provide contextually aware responses
– Build relationships over time
LangChain, LangGraph, and AutoGen all provide memory abstractions, but most developers only scratch the surface.
The difference between a demo and production? Memory that actually remembers.
Over to you: Which memory type is your agent missing?
Update: This post went viral so I’m teaming up with Nathan to teach it live this week on Tuesday June 10th.
RSVP here: lu.ma/fp9