Upgrade models for AI prompts and AI agents

When you customize AI prompts or AI agents in Amazon Connect, the model associated with each AI prompt determines which large language model (LLM) processes the instructions. Over time, newer and more capable models become available. This topic describes how to upgrade models across a few common scenarios.

Prerequisites

Before upgrading models, ensure you have the following:

When to upgrade

Amazon Connect notifies you when a model is scheduled for deprecation. Amazon Connect automatically redirects LLM inference to a supported model after any model passes its deprecation date, so there is no service disruption. However, upgrading manually before the deprecation date lets you choose the replacement model and test it in your environment. Use the following steps to determine which scenarios apply to you.

Step 1: Check for custom AI agents. In the admin website, navigate to AI agent designer, AI agents. Look at the Type column. System agents display - System after the type name (for example, "Answer Recommendation - System"). Agents without this suffix are custom agents you created.

Step 2: Check the Default AI Agent Configurations. On the same AI agents page, scroll to the Default AI Agent Configurations section. If any use case is pinned to a specific version (not set to Latest), you can update it → Scenario 3. This applies to all customers, even if you have no custom agents.

How model resolution works

When configuring an individual AI agent, you have the option to let Connect choose which LLM to use for each prompt, choose the model you want each prompt to use, or pick a combination of the two options.

Scenario 1: Custom AI agent with custom AI prompts

In this scenario, you created a custom AI agent and assigned one or more custom AI prompts to it. The custom prompts are pinned to the model you selected when you published them.

Custom prompts do not automatically receive model upgrades. You must manually update the model, publish a new prompt version, and update the AI agent.

If you only overrode some prompt types

Some AI agent types support multiple prompt types. For example, an Answer recommendation AI agent supports three prompt types: intent labeling generation, query reformulation, and answer generation. If you set only some of these to custom prompts and left the rest unset, the following applies:

Upgrade using the admin website

Step 1: Create a new prompt version with the updated model

Step 2: Update the AI agent to use the new prompt version

Step 3: Set the new AI agent version as the default

Upgrade using the AWS CLI

Update the AI prompt with the new model:

aws qconnect update-ai-prompt \
  --assistant-id assistant-id \
  --ai-prompt-id custom-prompt-id \
  --model-id new-model-id

Publish a new version of the prompt:

aws qconnect create-ai-prompt-version \
  --assistant-id assistant-id \
  --ai-prompt-id custom-prompt-id

Update the AI agent to reference the new prompt version:

aws qconnect update-ai-agent \
  --assistant-id assistant-id \
  --ai-agent-id custom-agent-id \
  --configuration '{
    "agentTypeConfiguration": {
      "promptTypeAIPromptId": "custom-prompt-id:new-version-number"
    }
  }'

Publish a new version of the AI agent:

aws qconnect create-ai-agent-version \
  --assistant-id assistant-id \
  --ai-agent-id custom-agent-id

Set the new AI agent version as the default:

aws qconnect update-assistant-ai-agent \
  --assistant-id assistant-id \
  --ai-agent-type AGENT_TYPE \
  --configuration '{
    "aiAgentId": "custom-agent-id:new-version-number"
  }'

Scenario 2: Custom AI agent with no prompt overrides

In this scenario, you created a custom AI agent to customize settings such as locale or knowledge base configuration, but you did not override any prompt types. All prompts are resolved from the system defaults.

Automatic upgrades

When Amazon Connect publishes new system AI agent and prompt versions with upgraded models, your custom AI agent automatically picks up the latest system prompt versions. No action is required.

This is because the unset prompt types are resolved at runtime from the current system defaults, which always point to the most recent system prompt versions.

Force a specific model before a system upgrade

If you want to use a newer model before Amazon Connect rolls it out as a system default:

This converts that prompt type into a Scenario 1 configuration.

Scenario 3: Updating Default AI Agent Configurations

The Default AI Agent Configurations section on the AI agents overview page controls which AI agent version is active for each use case (Answer Recommendation, Manual Search, Self Service, etc.).

When an Amazon Connect instance is created, each use case is automatically configured with a specific system AI agent version. These versions are pinned — they do not auto-update when Amazon Connect publishes new system AI agent versions or when you publish new custom AI agent versions. You must manually select the new version.

Upgrade using the admin website

Upgrade using the AWS CLI

aws qconnect update-assistant-ai-agent \
  --assistant-id assistant-id \
  --ai-agent-type AGENT_TYPE \
  --configuration '{
    "aiAgentId": "ai-agent-id:new-version-number"
  }'

Replace AGENT_TYPE with the use case type (for example, ANSWER_RECOMMENDATION, MANUAL_SEARCH, SELF_SERVICE).

Summary

Important considerations