What Are Projects?
Projects are Claude's persistent workspace feature. Unlike a plain conversation — which starts fresh each time — a Project remembers context across sessions through a knowledge base and custom instructions. It's the right tool whenever you have recurring, context-heavy work.
The Core Difference: What Persists
The fundamental difference between a conversation and a Project is what Claude retains between sessions:
Plain conversation
- Context resets at the start of each new conversation
- Claude has no memory of what you discussed yesterday
- You re-explain your background, preferences, and context every time
- Good for: one-off tasks, quick questions, isolated requests
Project
- Custom instructions are applied to every conversation in the Project
- Knowledge base documents are available in every conversation
- Previous conversation history within the Project is accessible
- Good for: ongoing work with shared context, recurring workflows
The Three Components of a Project
A Claude Project has three persistence mechanisms:
1. Custom Instructions
A block of text you write that tells Claude how to behave in this Project — your tone preferences, output format, relevant context about your role, what to assume about the audience, constraints, and persona. Applied automatically to every conversation in the Project. You write these once and they persist indefinitely.
2. Knowledge Base
Files you upload that Claude can reference in every conversation. Examples: your company style guide, a product spec document, a reference codebase, research papers, or a list of client requirements. You upload once; Claude can access these in any conversation within the Project without you re-uploading.
3. Conversation History
All conversations you start within a Project are stored together. Claude can reference earlier conversations in the same Project — "as we discussed last week..." — giving continuity across sessions. On Teams plans, this history is also shared with all Project members.
When to Use a Project vs a One-Off Conversation
Use a Project when one or more of these apply:
- You find yourself re-explaining the same context at the start of every conversation ("I'm a technical writer working for a B2B SaaS company...")
- You have reference documents you regularly ask Claude about
- The work spans multiple sessions and continuity matters
- You want consistent tone, format, or behaviour across all your interactions with Claude for a specific purpose
- You're working with a team and want shared context (Teams plan)
Use a plain conversation when:
- The task is completely self-contained and won't repeat
- You don't want previous conversations influencing the current one
- You're exploring something new where no prior context exists
Getting Started with a Project
- In Claude.ai, click "New Project" in the left sidebar
- Give the Project a descriptive name (e.g. "Product Copy", "Client: Acme Corp", "Research: AI Safety")
- Write your custom instructions — what Claude should know and how it should behave
- Upload relevant files to the knowledge base (optional but recommended for document-heavy work)
- Start your first conversation within the Project
Checklist: Do You Understand This?
- A Project persists context via three mechanisms: custom instructions, knowledge base, and conversation history
- Plain conversations reset; Projects remember across sessions
- Use a Project for recurring, context-heavy work — use plain conversations for one-off tasks
- Custom instructions are applied to every conversation in the Project automatically
- Knowledge base files are available in every conversation without re-uploading