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Claude Reference Files vs. Project Instructions and Skills: What Goes Where?

Claude.ai Project knowledge stores background material; Project instructions shape responses. Claude Code uses local CLAUDE.md memory, while Skills are a separate concept with setup details not established here.
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Use Claude.ai Project knowledge for source material Claude should draw on, and Project instructions for how it should respond in that workspace. In Claude Code, CLAUDE.md files provide local, file-based memory and guidance. Skills are a separate concept; the official documentation covered here does not establish enough detail to explain their setup or behavior reliably.

First, separate reference material from instructions

“Reference files” can mean different things depending on which Claude product you use. In Claude.ai, it usually means documents uploaded to a Project’s knowledge base. In Claude Code, it can mean contextual files or imports in a filesystem-based workflow. These are not the same feature.

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Reference material supplies facts, examples, or other background for Claude to consult. Instructions express what you want Claude to do with that context. Anthropic describes Projects as workspaces with their own chat histories and knowledge bases, while Project instructions tailor Claude’s responses in that Project. See What are projects? and How can I create and manage projects?.

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Claude.ai Projects: knowledge versus instructions

Project knowledge is background for chats in that Project

Upload reusable source material to a Project’s knowledge base when you want chats in that Project to draw on it. Anthropic says Project knowledge is used in all chats within the Project. Chat context itself is not shared across Project chats unless information is added to Project knowledge, so a useful answer in one chat does not automatically become shared background for the others. The details are in Anthropic’s Project management guidance.

Anthropic’s upload help page lists PDF, DOCX, CSV, TXT, HTML, ODT, RTF, EPUB, JSON, and XLSX as supported formats; XLSX requires the analysis tool to be enabled. It states a 30 MB limit per file and says the number of Project knowledge files is unlimited, subject to total content and context limits. Check the current upload guidance for availability and limits, which may depend on plan or change over time.

Project instructions shape how Claude responds

Use Project instructions for guidance that should apply to chats in that workspace: for example, the intended audience, how to handle supplied material, or the response format you prefer. Anthropic puts the scope plainly: “Claude will use these instructions for all the chats within the project.” This is distinct from uploading a document as background; a document can contain guidance, but Project instructions are the direct place for behavioral preferences specific to that Project.

Account-wide preferences and styles have different scopes

If a preference should apply broadly across Claude.ai rather than only within one Project, Anthropic distinguishes account-wide profile preferences from Project instructions. Styles are described as controls for tone and format. See Understanding Claude’s Personalization Features for those distinctions.

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Claude Code: file-based memory in a working environment

Claude Code’s CLAUDE.md files belong to a local filesystem workflow, not Claude.ai’s Project knowledge interface. Anthropic’s memory documentation distinguishes project memory at ./CLAUDE.md, user memory at ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md, and local project memory. It also documents imports and recursive discovery of files, and says memory files load at startup. Consult Manage Claude’s memory for the precise behavior; the linked page is in Chinese, so do not assume its details map to a Claude.ai Project setting.

Unlike a Project knowledge file, a CLAUDE.md can combine project context with instructions for the coding environment. The distinction is therefore partly about workflow: Project knowledge is managed in Claude.ai for chats in a Project, while repository or user memory files are managed on disk. A file stored in a repository can travel with that code when the repository is shared, but whether it is used depends on the user’s Claude Code setup and documented discovery behavior; it is not automatically synchronized with a Claude.ai Project.

Where skills fit—and what is not established here

Skills are a separate concept from Claude.ai Project knowledge, Project instructions, and Claude Code’s documented CLAUDE.md memory. The official material cited here does not establish current Skills file format, discovery rules, or invocation behavior. That means there is no reliable basis here for recommending a Skills setup procedure or treating Skills as another name for automatically loaded CLAUDE.md guidance.

For a practical choice, put source documents in Project knowledge when Claude.ai chats in one workspace need them; put workspace-specific behavioral guidance in Project instructions; use profile preferences for account-wide guidance and styles for tone or format. For Claude Code, use the official memory documentation to understand the relevant local file scope. Verify current official Skills documentation before relying on Skills conventions.

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How Anthropic describes Project knowledge capacity

Anthropic says retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) for Projects activates automatically near context limits and can expand Project knowledge capacity by up to 10x. This is Anthropic’s product description, not an independent performance measurement. See Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) for Projects.

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