Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide techniques for user equipment (UE) cooperation. Certain aspects provide a method for wireless communication by a target UE. The method generally includes receiving availability information indicating availability of one or more candidate UEs for cooperating with the target UE for communicating with a network entity, receiving assistance information from at least one of the candidate UEs, establishing a cooperation connection with the at least one of the candidate UEs based on the assistance information, and transmitting, to the network entity, an indication of UE capability based on the cooperation connection.