Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described. Generally, a base station may dynamically and reliably indicate that pending transmissions are part of a full duplex operation via downlink control information (DCI) designs described herein. For example, a base station may transmit, to a user equipment (UE) a DCI including no more than one downlink grant and no more than one uplink grant for a full duplex operation. In some examples, the base station may transmit a first-stage DCI including partial information, and second-stage DCIs including full uplink and downlink grants for a full duplex operation. In some examples, the base station may configure periodic or semi-periodic uplink and downlink resources that may overlap in time, and may dynamically indicate, to the UE, whether the overlapping uplink and downlink resources are scheduled for a full duplex operation.