Cowork and Claude Code: Set Up Both and Know Which to Use

Cowork and Claude Code look like two different products. Underneath, they share the same agent. The difference is the room you give it: Cowork works in your documents and apps, Claude Code works in a project folder with a terminal. I use both every day, and the trick is knowing which one to open before you start typing.

The short version

• Cowork lives in the Claude desktop app, in its own Cowork tab. It reads and writes files on your computer, uses your connected apps, and produces finished documents, spreadsheets and decks. No terminal. Reach for it for research, reports, file cleanup, inbox and calendar work.
• Claude Code runs in your terminal, in VS Code, or in the Code tab of the same desktop app. It edits files and runs commands inside a project. Reach for it when the result is software: a website, an app, a script, a data pipeline.

Both need a paid plan (Pro, Max, Team or Enterprise). If the finished thing is a document, start in Cowork. If the finished thing runs, start in Claude Code.

Set up Cowork in about 15 minutes

1. Install the desktop app

Download it from claude.com/download, sign in, and open the Cowork tab.

2. Give it one working folder

Cowork works best with a single home folder instead of your whole drive. Make one with three subfolders:

Claude Work/
  context/     who you are, your voice, current priorities
  inbox/       files you drop in for Claude to process
  output/      everything Claude produces

Point Cowork at this folder when you start a task. A clear structure tells Claude where to look and where to write, and it keeps your other files out of reach.

3. Write a short context file

Inside context/, create about-me.md. Keep it to one page. Long bios feel thorough and just dilute the parts that matter.

# About me
Role: [what you do, for whom]
Current priorities: [three, this quarter]
Voice: [3 adjectives] + two real paragraphs I wrote, pasted below
Always: [e.g. American English, short paragraphs, plain words]
Never: [e.g. no dashes as punctuation, no exclamation marks]
When a task is done: save to output/ and give me a 3 line summary

Real samples of your writing do more than any list of adjectives. Paste two.

4. Set global instructions

In the desktop app, open Settings, then Cowork, and add global instructions: the preferences that apply to every task, such as "read context/about-me.md before starting any writing task." Cowork also supports folder instructions, which add context only when you work in a specific local folder.

5. Connect your apps

Open Customize in the sidebar. That is where connectors, skills and plugins live. Turn on the connectors for the tools your work actually sits in, like Google Drive, Gmail, Calendar, Notion or Slack. Each one asks you to sign in once. For each connector you can decide whether actions are always allowed, need approval, or are blocked. Start with approval for anything that writes.

6. Schedule one recurring task

Type /schedule in Cowork and describe something you do every week, like "every Monday at 8am, read my calendar for this week and last week's sent email, and save a one page week plan as a Google Doc." Scheduled tasks run in the cloud, so the app does not need to be open. That also means they work through your connectors, so point them at cloud tools rather than folders on your laptop.

Set up Claude Code in about 10 minutes

1. Install

On macOS or Linux, open Terminal and run:

curl -fsSL https://claude.ai/install.sh | bash

On Windows, run this in PowerShell:

irm https://claude.ai/install.ps1 | iex

Homebrew (brew install --cask claude-code) and WinGet (winget install Anthropic.ClaudeCode) also work. If you would rather not touch a terminal at all, the Code tab in the desktop app runs the same thing with a visual interface.

2. Start in a project folder

mkdir my-site && cd my-site
git init
claude

The first run opens a browser to sign in. Run git init before anything else, because git is your undo button. After Claude changes something you can see exactly what changed with git diff.

3. Create CLAUDE.md

Type /init. Claude reads the folder and writes a CLAUDE.md file, which it loads at the start of every session in that project. Edit it down to what is true and useful: what the project is, how to run it, and your rules. For preferences across all projects, use ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md. Type /memory any time to open these files.

4. Learn five controls

• Shift+Tab cycles permission modes, including Plan, where Claude proposes a plan before editing anything. Use Plan for anything bigger than a small fix.
• Esc stops Claude mid task so you can redirect it. Pressing Esc twice on an empty prompt opens the rewind menu to go back to an earlier point.
• /clear starts a fresh conversation. Use it when you switch tasks.
• /compact summarizes a long conversation to free up context.
• /model switches models.

Make both tools share one brain

Cowork does not read Claude Code's ~/.claude folder on your machine. Each tool has its own place for instructions, so the easy mistake is writing your preferences twice and letting them drift apart. Keep your context in one file and point both tools at it. I keep one short profile and reference it from both sides:

# in CLAUDE.md
Before writing any copy, read ~/Claude Work/context/about-me.md
and follow its voice rules.

Skills follow the same split. Cowork loads the skills enabled in Customize for your Claude account. Claude Code loads skills from ~/.claude/skills/ and from the project's .claude/skills/ folder. To use one skill in both, build it once and add it in both places.

A simple way to choose each morning

• "Summarize these 12 PDFs into a brief" goes to Cowork.
• "Turn that brief into a landing page and deploy it" goes to Claude Code.
• "Rename and sort 400 files in Downloads" can go either way. Cowork is friendlier; Claude Code is faster once you trust it.
• "Check this every Monday" goes to a scheduled task in Cowork, or a routine from Claude Code if it needs a repository.

Start by setting up Cowork with the folder and context file today, then install Claude Code and run /init in one real project. After a week you will stop thinking about which tool to open. The references worth bookmarking are Get started with Cowork and the Claude Code quickstart.