diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 6f4cb64a..664b8954 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -117,6 +117,7 @@ The **Version** column carries the specification's compatibility class
 | ID | Document | Version | Status |
 |----|----------|---------|--------|
 | OVOS-PIPELINE-1 | [Utterance Lifecycle and Pipeline](pipeline-1.md) | 2 | Draft |
+| OVOS-READY-1 | [Boot Readiness and the Utterance Lifecycle](ready-1.md) | 1 | Draft |
 | OVOS-TRANSFORM-1 | [Transformer Plugins](transformer.md) | 2 | Draft |
 | OVOS-CONTEXT-1 | [Intent Context](intent-context.md) | 2 | Draft |
 | OVOS-CONVERSE-1 | [Active Handlers and Interactive Response](converse.md) | 2 | Draft |
@@ -152,7 +153,7 @@ picture — the tables above are an index.
 **Reading order by role:**
 - *Writing a skill?* INTENT-1 → INTENT-2 → INTENT-3. INTENT-4 only if you need the registration wire format.
 - *Building a pipeline plugin?* PIPELINE-1, then SESSION-1 + SESSION-2, then the role spec (CONVERSE-1, CONTEXT-1, TRANSFORM-1, or STOP-1).
-- *Building an orchestrator?* MSG-1 → SESSION-1 → SESSION-2 → PIPELINE-1, then INTENT-4, CONTEXT-1, CONVERSE-1, TRANSFORM-1, STOP-1.
+- *Building an orchestrator?* MSG-1 → SESSION-1 → SESSION-2 → PIPELINE-1 → READY-1, then INTENT-4, CONTEXT-1, CONVERSE-1, TRANSFORM-1, STOP-1.
 - *Surveying the architecture?* [appendix/overview.md §1](appendix/overview.md) for the three-stack narrative.
 
 For background — design rationale, comparisons with other systems,
diff --git a/ready-1.md b/ready-1.md
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@@ -0,0 +1,105 @@
+# Boot Readiness and the Utterance Lifecycle
+
+**Spec ID:** OVOS-READY-1 · **Version:** 1 · **Status:** Draft
+
+This document defines when the orchestrator is ready, and the one
+requirement it places on the utterance lifecycle (OVOS-PIPELINE-1
+§6/§9.1): an utterance that arrives before the orchestrator can answer
+**MUST NOT** enter the pipeline loop at all.
+
+It builds on OVOS-PIPELINE-1 (the utterance lifecycle and pipeline
+plugin abstraction this spec gates).
+
+The key words **MUST**, **MUST NOT**, **SHOULD**, **SHOULD NOT**,
+**RECOMMENDED** and **MAY** are used as in RFC 2119.
+
+## 1. Scope
+
+This specification defines:
+
+- when the orchestrator is **ready** (§2): every configured pipeline
+  is able to match intents, and the skills have been registered;
+- the **lifecycle gate** (§3): what the orchestrator does with an
+  utterance until it is ready.
+
+## 2. Ready
+
+A pipeline is either **loading** or **loaded**. It is loaded when it
+is able to match intents against what is registered with it: its
+models, indexes and any other state it needs to answer a `match`
+(OVOS-PIPELINE-1 §4) call are in place. It does not stop being loaded
+because more intents are registered later; it keeps serving what it
+had and gains the new intents when it has absorbed them.
+
+The orchestrator is **ready** once every configured pipeline is
+loaded and the skills it routes to have been registered (§2.2).
+Readiness is reached once and is not lost: a pipeline gaining intents
+or a skill being installed later does not make the orchestrator
+unready.
+
+A pipeline that fails to load does not hold readiness back for ever.
+It cannot match, so the orchestrator treats it as not configured and
+reports the failure the way it reports any other error; nothing more
+needs to be specified here, and no further signal is defined.
+
+An implementation **MAY** consider itself not ready until other
+subsystems it depends on to serve a request correctly (audio output,
+a listener, a GUI surface) are ready too.
+
+### 2.1 Skills
+
+An utterance that belongs to a skill that has not registered yet is
+matched to whatever else is registered, or to nothing. The orchestrator
+therefore **MUST NOT** be ready until every skill the component that
+loads skills started with has finished loading. How the orchestrator
+learns this is implementation-defined, but it **MUST** be able to
+learn it when it starts after that load already finished, rather than
+wait for a notification sent before it was listening.
+
+This applies to the initial set of skills only. A skill installed,
+upgraded or reloaded afterwards **MUST NOT** make the orchestrator
+unready.
+
+A deployment with no component that loads skills has nothing to wait
+for here.
+
+## 3. Gating the utterance lifecycle
+
+Until the orchestrator is ready (§2), it **MUST NOT** run the pipeline
+loop (OVOS-PIPELINE-1 §6) for an incoming `ovos.utterance.handle`
+(§9.1). It **MUST** instead:
+
+1. respond with either a short "still starting" dialog on
+   `ovos.utterance.speak` (§9.6) or a non-verbal error sound; the
+   choice is implementation-defined. A spoken dialog **MUST** be
+   rendered in the language OVOS-SESSION-1 §3.2.3 gives for
+   responses: `output_lang` when the session sets it, otherwise the
+   utterance language resolved at intake (§3.2.7). An implementation
+   with no localization for that language **MUST** play the error
+   sound instead, never a dialog in some other language;
+2. carry the error identifier `ovos.ready.not_ready` in
+   `context.error` of whichever response step 1 sent, so a listener
+   can tell this reply apart from an ordinary one and knows why it was
+   declined;
+3. emit `ovos.utterance.handled` as it would for a normal utterance,
+   so a caller does not wait on a terminal event that never arrives;
+4. produce none of the pipeline-loop side effects (§8's
+   handler-lifecycle trio, `ovos.intent.matched` / `.unmatched`): none
+   of them ran.
+
+A caller gets a prompt response either way, and it says why, rather
+than guessing from silence or risking a wrong match.
+
+## 4. Conformance
+
+A conforming orchestrator:
+
+- is not ready while a configured pipeline is loading or while any
+  of the initial skills is still loading (§2, §2.1);
+- once ready, stays ready (§2);
+- never runs the pipeline loop while not ready, substituting the
+  decline of §3;
+- resumes ordinary matching as soon as it is ready.
+
+A conforming pipeline does not answer a `match` call with partial
+state while it is loading.