Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Runtime targets

You can add an Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Runtime agent as a gateway target. The gateway sends traffic directly to the runtime agent without aggregation or protocol translation. Unlike MCP targets that combine tool capabilities into a unified virtual MCP server, the AgentCore Runtime target forwards requests and responses between clients and the runtime agent without modification.

Adding an AgentCore Runtime target to your gateway is useful when you want to:

Key considerations and limitations

When working with AgentCore Runtime targets, be aware of the following considerations:

Target configuration

When you create an AgentCore Runtime target, you provide the runtime ARN and an optional qualifier. The gateway resolves the runtime endpoint internally, so you don’t need to construct the runtime URL yourself.

The target configuration for an AgentCore Runtime target uses the following structure:

{
    "http": {
        "agentcoreRuntime": {
            "arn": "arn:aws:bedrock-agentcore:us-west-2:111122223333:runtime/RUNTIME_ID",
            "qualifier": "DEFAULT",
            "schema": {
                "source": {
                    "s3": {
                        "uri": "s3://DOC-EXAMPLE-BUCKET/agent-schema.yaml"
                    }
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

If the Runtime and gateway are in the same AgentCore project and you don’t need a schema, add the Runtime target by name. The gateway must be created without --protocol-type MCP:

agentcore add gateway-target \
  --gateway MyGateway \
  --name MyRuntimeTarget \
  --runtime MyRuntime

agentcore deploy

To add an HTTP Runtime target with a schema for guardrails, deploy the Runtime and gateway first. Then run the AWS CLI command aws bedrock-agentcore-control create-gateway-target with a --target-configuration that includes http.agentcoreRuntime.schema, as shown in Add the Runtime target with a schema. Before you create the target, grant the gateway’s execution role bedrock-agentcore:InvokeAgentRuntime on the Runtime and s3:GetObject on the schema object in agentcore/cdk/lib/cdk-stack.ts, as shown in Add a policy engine and gateway, and run agentcore deploy. The target is not part of the project, and agentcore deploy does not manage it. Before you remove the gateway from the project, delete this target with aws bedrock-agentcore-control delete-gateway-target --gateway-identifier <GATEWAY_ID> --target-id <TARGET_ID>. Otherwise the next agentcore deploy can fail to delete the gateway or leave the target behind. If the gateway is replaced, create the target again.

Invoking an AgentCore Runtime target

To invoke an AgentCore Runtime target through the gateway, send a POST request to the target’s invocation URL. The URL format is:

https://{gatewayId}.gateway.bedrock-agentcore.{region}.amazonaws.com/{targetName}/invocations

Replace {gatewayId} with your gateway ID, {region} with the AWS Region, and {targetName} with the name of the target.

The following example uses curl to invoke an AgentCore Runtime target:

curl -X POST https://gateway-id.gateway.bedrock-agentcore.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/my-target/invocations \
    -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
    -H "Authorization: Bearer <token>" \
    -d '{"input": {"prompt": "Hello"}}'

For a target on a gateway in your AgentCore project, agentcore invoke --gateway builds the URL from the target path. Add --bearer-token for a CUSTOM_JWT gateway. Omit it for an AWS_IAM or NONE gateway:

agentcore invoke --gateway MyGateway \
  --path /MyRuntimeTarget/invocations \
  --payload '{"input": {"prompt": "Hello"}}'

You can also use the AWS CLI with an endpoint URL override:

aws bedrock-agentcore invoke-agent-runtime \
    --endpoint-url https://gateway-id.gateway.bedrock-agentcore.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/my-target \
    --agent-runtime-arn arn:aws:bedrock-agentcore:us-west-2:111122223333:runtime/RUNTIME_ID \
    --content-type application/json \
    --payload '{"input": {"prompt": "Hello"}}' \
    --cli-binary-format raw-in-base64-out \
    response.json

Outbound authorization

AgentCore Runtime targets support the following outbound authorization types:

Enforcing traffic through the gateway

Front your AgentCore Runtime with an AgentCore Gateway so that the gateway is the only entry point. The gateway applies policy-based authorization, Amazon Bedrock Guardrails, request and response interceptors, and observability. For the rationale, see Front your runtime with an AgentCore Gateway. To stop callers from bypassing the gateway, restrict the runtime to gateway traffic. This works for both IAM (SigV4) and OAuth (JWT) inbound authorization.

You configure this restriction on the runtime. The gateway stamps the source of every request it forwards, and the runtime validates that source on the way in. The specific mechanism depends on the runtime’s inbound authorization type:

Capability comparison with MCP targets

You can integrate MCP servers with the Amazon Bedrock AgentCore gateway using two approaches: using the MCP target type in aggregation mode, or using the AgentCore Runtime target type. The following table compares the capabilities of each approach.