Lesson Content

The modes are not isolated – they are phases.

Chat, Code, and Cowork are not three separate tools that happen to share a desktop app. They are three phases of a single AI system that share your account, your settings, and your context. Understanding what connects them – and what separates them – is what allows you to use all three fluidly.

What carries across all three modes.

Your Claude account is the unifying layer. These things are consistent across Chat, Code, and Cowork:

• Your account identity: You are signed into one Claude account. Your subscription, your profile, and your settings are the same in all three modes.
• Custom Instructions: The profile-level instructions you write apply to all modes. Claude knows who you are and how you prefer to work regardless of which mode you open.
• Conversation history: Sessions from all three modes appear in your Recents sidebar. You can reference prior work across modes.
• Projects: Projects created in Chat are accessible across all modes. A Project's uploaded files and instructions are available wherever you open Claude.

What is mode-specific.

• CLAUDE.md files: These are specific to Code mode and to the directory where they are created. They do not apply to Chat or Cowork sessions.
• Cowork Plugins, Connectors, and Skills: These are set up in Cowork and apply only to Cowork sessions. A Gmail Connector authorized in Cowork does not give Chat or Code access to your Gmail.
• Code mode tool permissions: File access and shell command permissions granted in a Code session apply to that session only. They do not persist to Chat.
• Routines: Scheduled recurring tasks set up in Cowork run in Cowork mode only.

Designing a multi-mode workflow.

The most effective multi-mode workflows treat mode transitions as natural handoffs:

Research -> Writing -> Distribution

• Cowork: Use a Connector to pull current data from Drive or search relevant docs for context
• Chat: Draft the document, report, or communication using that context
• Cowork: Distribute the finished output via email or Slack through a Connector

Data -> Analysis -> Documentation

• Code: Read and process a local data file, produce a structured output
• Chat: Analyze the output, identify insights, draft the narrative
• Code: Write the final document to a specific file in the right location

Planning -> Execution -> Summary

• Chat: Think through the plan, identify steps, clarify the approach
• Code: Execute the steps that involve file operations or commands
• Cowork: Send the summary and next steps to stakeholders

Building your personal Claude routine.

Most power users settle into a daily pattern that uses at least two modes:

A typical morning might start in Cowork (morning briefing Routine summarizes email and calendar), move to Chat (respond to the priorities surfaced by the briefing, do writing and thinking work), and use Code when a task requires local file access or multi-step execution.

The key is not to switch modes aimlessly but to switch deliberately – when the current mode has reached the limit of what it can do for the current task, and the next mode is the right tool for the next step.