Open the Claude desktop app, go to Customize → Skills, click +, and upload the skill's ZIP. Claude reads the SKILL.md inside and switches it on. Skills need code execution enabled, under Settings → Capabilities. Anthropic's help centre currently lists Skills on Free, Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise, while its Academy tutorial lists Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise - so if you are on the free plan, check Settings → Capabilities for your own account rather than taking either page's word for it. If the menu is not there, or you are in ChatGPT or Gemini, paste the file's text into custom instructions instead and you get the same behaviour without the automatic triggering.
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Before you start: the one setting that decides everything
Two things gate the Skills menu, and most "I can't install skills" posts confuse them.
- Your plan. Anthropic's help centre currently lists Skills on Free, Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise, while its Academy tutorial lists Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise - so check Settings → Capabilities for your own account rather than taking either page's word for it. If there is no Skills menu on your account, jump to Method 2, which works on any plan and in any AI chat.
- Code execution. The menu stays greyed out until this is on, and it is the more common cause by far. Open Settings → Capabilities and turn on Code execution and file creation. On Team and Enterprise an owner controls it for the whole organisation, so if yours is off the toggle is not yours to flip and you need to ask them.
Sort those two out first and steps 1 to 6 below take about two minutes. Need a skill to install? Pick one from the Claude skills catalogue.
Method 1: upload the skill to Claude
Bought from KissMySkills with a Library subscription? Skip the upload. Add KissMySkills once as a connector (Customize → Connectors → + → Add custom connector, URL https://mcp.kissmyskills.com/mcp), sign in with your email and ask for any skill by name. Nothing to download; setup for Claude, ChatGPT, Claude Code, Codex and Cursor is on the connector page. The steps below are for a single .skill file, which Claude takes as it is.
This is the native route, where Claude picks the skill up on its own whenever your request matches what it is for.
- Open the Claude desktop app and look at the left sidebar.
- Click Customize, then Skills. This is where your installed skills live.
- Click the + button. Add an official skill, or choose Create skill to upload your own.
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Upload the ZIP. Claude reads the
SKILL.mdat the root and shows you a summary of what the skill does. Read that summary: it is Claude telling you what it understood, and if it sounds vague, the skill's description is vague and it will trigger unpredictably. - Toggle it on. It appears in the list with a switch. Uploaded is not the same as enabled.
- Use it. Ask for the task the skill was built for. You do not name the skill; Claude matches your request against its description.
Where the file actually lives, by surface
This is the part that catches people out, because "installed" means something different depending on where you are working.
| Surface | Where the skill has to be |
|---|---|
| Claude app | Uploaded through Customize → Skills. It lives on your account, so it follows you to any device you sign in on. |
| Claude Code, personal |
~/.claude/skills/<name>/ - applies to every project on that machine. |
| Claude Code, project |
.claude/skills/<name>/ inside the repository - travels with the repo, so the whole team gets it. |
| Cowork and cloud sessions | They do not read the folder on your machine. They load the skills enabled on your account, synced when the session starts. |
.claude/skills/ folder comes back as "not found" in Cowork or a cloud session, because those run somewhere else entirely and sync from your account instead. If a skill works in your terminal and not in the cloud, this is almost always why: upload it through Customize → Skills as well, rather than hunting for a bug.
Looking for the skills folder on a Mac? On claude.ai and in the desktop app there is no folder to find: the skill lives on your account once uploaded. The folder only exists for Claude Code, at ~/.claude/skills/ in your home directory. Finder hides folders that start with a dot, so press Cmd+Shift+G and type ~/.claude/skills, or press Cmd+Shift+. to show hidden folders.
Claude Code, in one line
Skip the interface. unzip code-reviewer.zip -d ~/.claude/skills/ puts it in the personal folder. Check that a valid SKILL.md sits at the folder root, restart, and run /skills to confirm it loaded.
Exactly the kind of ZIP you upload at step 4: unzip it, add it through Customize → Skills, toggle it on, and ask for a content calendar or a brief.
View Lena →Method 2: paste it instead
Use this where there is no Skills menu, in ChatGPT or Gemini, or anywhere you cannot turn code execution on.
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Open the
SKILL.md. It is plain Markdown; any text editor will do. Prompt packs are often.txt. - Copy all of it.
- Find the standing-instructions field in your assistant: system prompt, custom instructions, or a project's instructions.
- Paste and save.
- Start working. The assistant behaves like the specialist from the first message.
What you give up is automatic triggering: the instructions apply to everything in that chat or project rather than switching on when relevant. For a single-purpose project that is often what you wanted anyway.
A custom-instructions field holds one skill at a time: to switch, clear it, paste the next file and save. ChatGPT calls this field Custom Instructions; Gemini calls it Saved Info. Keep your skill files in one named folder so switching is a copy-paste, not a search.
Every file in the KissMySkills library works this way, and the free browser tools let you see the style of the writing before you buy anything.
Where to get skills
- Official Anthropic skills - a small built-in set for document work: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF.
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Your own - a folder with a
SKILL.md, a sharp description and clear steps. The right call for a workflow only your team has. - Ready-made - over 2,000 skills, 300+ prompt packs and 100+ agents in this catalogue. Browse all skills, the Claude Code collection of 137 files, or the prompt packs.
Agents are $39 each, so fifty-five of them come to $2,145. One purchase and one download instead of installing them one at a time.
View Everything Bundle →When it does not work
- Skills menu missing or greyed out. The most likely cause is that code execution is off: turn on Code execution and file creation under Settings → Capabilities, or ask an owner on Team and Enterprise. Plan availability is the thing to check second, because Anthropic's help centre and its Academy tutorial currently disagree about whether the free plan is included - go by what your own account shows.
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Uploaded but never appears. The
SKILL.mdis not at the root of the ZIP. Zipping a folder that contains the folder that contains the file is the usual cause. Open the archive and check thatSKILL.mdis the first thing you see. -
Installed but never triggers. The description is doing the triggering, not the title. "Helps with marketing" matches nothing in particular; "use when writing or reviewing cold outbound email sequences" matches precisely. Edit the description line and re-upload. In Claude Code, run
/skillsto confirm it loaded and restart after adding files. - Triggers on everything. The opposite problem, same cause. Narrow the description, or toggle the skill off when you are not doing that job.
- Works in the terminal, not in the cloud. Cowork and cloud sessions sync from your account, not from your disk. Upload the same file through Customize → Skills.
- Two skills fighting over the same request. If their descriptions overlap, Claude will pick one and it may not be the one you meant. Toggle the other one off, or make the descriptions name different situations rather than different job titles.
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The file opens in the wrong app or downloads again. A
.mdfile is plain text, and some systems think it needs a special program. Right-click it, choose Open with, and pick any text editor. There is nothing to unpack and nothing to run. - The download email never arrived. Check spam first. If it is genuinely missing, contact us with your order number and we will resend the file.
Is it safe?
A skill is text instructions, sometimes with scripts alongside. Anthropic's own guidance is to use skills only from sources you trust, and to audit anything from an unknown source before enabling it, because a skill can direct Claude to run code and use tools in ways its description does not mention. Open the SKILL.md and read it before you use it, the way you would skim a contract. Treat a skill that bundles executable scripts, or that fetches data from external URLs, with the same caution you would give any download, and prefer sources that let you see the contents before you buy.
Ready to install your first one?
Pick a skill, upload or paste it, and watch the assistant specialise. Browse the full library, try the free browser tools first, or read what Claude Skills are if the concept is new.
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