AGILE is a Small Scientific Mission of the Italian Space Agency dedicated to high-energy astrophysics that will be launched in 2002. The AGILE instrument is designed to detect and image photons in the 30~MeV--50~GeV and 10--40 keV energy bands, with excellent space resolution and timing capability, and an unprecedently large field of view covering ~1/4 of the entire sky at energies above 30 MeV. Primary scientific goals include the study of AGNs, gamma-ray bursts, Galactic sources, unidentified gamma-ray sources, diffuse Galactic and extragalactic gamma-ray emission, high-precision timing studies, and Quantum Gravity testing.
Here we describe the AGILE instruments, the expected performances and the AGILE Scientific Programme.