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Semantic Kernel (Legacy)

Semantic Kernel was Microsoft's primary AI orchestration story before Agent Framework. As of April 2026, SK is no longer the recommended path for new agent work — but it remains relevant for existing codebases and for some advanced orchestration features that haven't fully migrated. This subsection is honest about both.

Topics (canonical order)

  •   Why It's Still Relevant

    Where SK still shines, what hasn't migrated, who should still pick it

  •   SK vs Agent Framework

    Side-by-side comparison, migration cost, decision criteria

  •   Deprecated Planners

    HandlebarsPlanner / StepwisePlanner — explicitly DO NOT USE in new code; migration to auto function calling

Cross-references