Complete Claude Guide

Claude is Anthropic's AI assistant and family of large language models.

You can use it to:

• Write and rewrite content
• Research topics
• Analyze documents and data
• Summarize information
• Brainstorm ideas
• Write and debug code
• Build apps and websites
• Analyze images and PDFs
• Create documents, spreadsheets and presentations
• Use connected apps and external tools
• Automate multi-step workflows
• Perform agentic tasks

Everyday questions

Sonnet 5

Writing and content

Sonnet 5

Fast coding

Sonnet 5

High-volume workflows

Sonnet 5

Complex reasoning

Opus 5

Advanced coding

Opus 5

Production AI agents

Opus 5

High-stakes professional work

Opus 5

Extremely difficult coding

Fable 5.1

Long-running autonomous projects

Fable 5.1

Complex multi-stage knowledge work

Fable 5.1

Writing

Draft articles, emails, reports, scripts, posts and documents.

Reasoning

Break complicated problems into logical steps and analyze trade-offs.

Coding

Generate, explain, debug, refactor and review code.

Vision

Understand uploaded screenshots, charts, diagrams, photos and documents.

Data analysis

Analyze datasets, calculate metrics, write code and create visualizations.

Document analysis

Read PDFs and uploaded files, summarize them and extract insights.

Web search

Search current information on the web when web access is enabled.

Research

Run multi-step research across multiple sources and synthesize findings.

Computer use

Agentic Claude experiences can interact with computer interfaces.

Tool use

Claude models can work with external tools and connected services.

Research turns Claude into a multi-step research agent.

Projects are dedicated AI workspaces.

Claude can remember useful context across conversations where supported.

• Your role
• Your projects
• People you work with
• Communication preferences
• Coding preferences
• Working style
• Ongoing project details

This reduces the need to repeatedly provide the same context.

Skills give Claude specialized instructions and resources for repeatable tasks.

Simple custom Skills can be created using structured instructions without requiring advanced programming.

Artifacts provide a dedicated workspace for substantial content Claude creates.

• Documents
• Code
• Websites
• SVG graphics
• Diagrams
• Interactive components
• Apps
• Visualizations

You can continue refining an Artifact through conversation.

Claude can create useful files such as:

• Spreadsheets
• Presentations
• Documents
• PDFs
• Charts
• Data visualizations
• Code files

Create an Excel financial model using this CSV.

Claude can analyze the data, calculate metrics, build formulas, generate charts and produce the finished output.

Claude Code is Anthropic's agentic coding environment.

Instead of only generating code snippets, Claude Code can work across a software project.

Cowork brings Claude's agentic capabilities to broader knowledge work.

Think of regular Claude as collaborating through conversation. Think of Cowork as delegating a job for Claude to execute.

Claude's agentic tools can perform actions through computer interfaces. Depending on the Claude product and configuration, Claude can:

• Navigate websites
• Click interface elements
• Work with browser pages
• Open files
• Use development tools
• Perform multi-step digital workflows

This moves Claude from simply answering questions toward executing tasks.

Claude Design is a conversational design workspace.

You describe what you want and Claude generates the design on a visual canvas.

Then refine the result through conversation and editing.

Claude can connect with external tools and data.

MCP stands for Model Context Protocol.

MCP

Gives Claude access to tools and data.

Skills

Teach Claude how to perform specialized workflows.

Claude can generate visual and interactive content such as:

• Charts
• Diagrams
• Interactive visualizations
• HTML interfaces
• SVG graphics

Claude can also analyze uploaded images. Its visual creation capabilities can use code, HTML, SVG and related technologies.

For harder tasks, Claude models can devote more computation to reasoning before producing an answer.

Higher effort

More computation for difficult problems

Lower effort

Faster and potentially cheaper execution

Upload data and ask Claude to:

• Clean it
• Analyze it
• Find patterns
• Calculate statistics
• Create charts
• Write code
• Build models
• Explain findings
• Generate reports
• Create spreadsheets

Claude can help create:

• Social posts
• Articles
• Newsletters
• Video scripts
• Hooks
• Ad copy
• Landing pages
• Emails
• Product descriptions
• Content strategies
• Research briefs

Use Claude as a personalized tutor.

Teach me [TOPIC] from beginner to advanced. Use simple explanations, practical examples, exercises and short quizzes.

Instead of: “Build an app.”

Build a responsive expense-tracking web app using React and TypeScript. First create an implementation plan, then build the core functionality, test important flows, identify bugs and fix them before presenting the final result.

Instead of: “Research AI agents.”

Research the current AI-agent market. Compare the major categories, companies, business models, adoption trends and unresolved problems. Prioritize primary sources and recent information. Clearly separate facts from analysis.

Upload:

• Reports
• Research papers
• PDFs
• Contracts
• Presentations
• Spreadsheets
• Notes

Analyze this document and return the key arguments, important numbers, assumptions, risks, contradictions, unanswered questions and five most important takeaways.

Role

Who Claude should act as.

Goal

Exactly what you want accomplished.

Context

Background Claude needs.

Input

The information Claude should work from.

Constraints

Rules it must follow.

Process

How it should approach the task.

Output

Exactly how the result should be structured.

Quality check

What Claude should verify before finishing.

Act as a [ROLE]. Your goal is to [GOAL]. Context: [BACKGROUND] Use this input: [INPUT] Requirements: [REQUIREMENT 1] [REQUIREMENT 2] [REQUIREMENT 3] Constraints: [CONSTRAINTS] Process: 1. Understand the objective. 2. Identify important assumptions. 3. Work through the problem systematically. 4. Verify important facts and calculations. 5. Review the result for errors. Output: [DESIRED FORMAT] Before finishing, check that the answer is accurate, complete, logically consistent and follows every requirement.

Learn

Teach me [TOPIC] from beginner to advanced using simple explanations and practical examples.

Research

Research [TOPIC], compare the strongest available evidence and give me the most important conclusions.

Write

Rewrite this for clarity, simplicity and impact while preserving the original meaning.

Summarize

Summarize this into the essential ideas, important facts, decisions and action items.

Analyze

Analyze this from multiple perspectives. Identify opportunities, risks, assumptions and blind spots.

Brainstorm

Generate 30 unconventional ideas for [GOAL]. Avoid obvious suggestions.

Critique

Critique this constructively. Find weak assumptions, logical gaps and ways to improve it.

Code

Build [PROJECT]. Plan first, implement it, test the important functionality and fix issues before finishing.

Data

Analyze this dataset. Identify important trends, anomalies, relationships and actionable insights.

Decide

Compare [OPTION A] and [OPTION B] against cost, upside, downside, difficulty, time and long-term value, then recommend one.

Claude can still:

• Hallucinate information
• Misinterpret ambiguous prompts
• Produce incorrect calculations
• Generate buggy code
• Misread complex documents
• Miss recent information without web access
• Make mistakes while using tools
• Fail during long agentic workflows

For important work: verify the output.

Free

Best for occasional Claude use.

Pro

Best for regular individual users.

Max

Best for heavy individual users.

Team

Best for organizations needing collaboration, administration and higher usage.

Enterprise

Best for organizations requiring advanced security, compliance, governance and scalable usage.

Claude

Conversational AI assistant

Projects

Persistent workspaces

Memory

Cross-conversation context

Research

Deep multi-source investigation

Artifacts

Interactive apps and reusable outputs

Skills

Reusable specialized workflows

Connectors + MCP

External tools and data

Claude Code

Agentic software development

Cowork

Agentic knowledge work

Claude Design

Conversational design and prototyping

API

Claude capabilities inside other products

Step 1

Choose the right Claude model.

Step 2

Give it relevant context.

Step 3

Clearly define the desired outcome.

Step 4

Attach files or connect data when useful.

Step 5

Use Research for deep current information.

Step 6

Use Projects for ongoing work.

Step 7

Use Skills for repeatable workflows.

Step 8

Use Artifacts or file creation for finished outputs.

Step 9

Use Claude Code or Cowork when Claude needs to execute larger tasks.

Step 10

Review and verify the final result.