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The Day-One Claude Setup: Five Layers, in Order

By Nigel Guy · 8 min read

Most people set Claude up backwards. They open a chat, pick the most expensive-sounding model, hunt for a web search switch that may no longer exist, and only weeks later write down how they actually want Claude to behave, by which point every project has been set up with different, half-remembered instructions. It feels fine because each chat works on its own. What it gives you is a tool that has to be re-briefed every morning.

The rule: set Claude up from the widest layer to the narrowest. That means account-wide rules first, then search, then Projects, then folders and Cowork, and the model last. Each layer inherits from the one above, so a mistake near the top gets copied into everything below it.

Before you start

You need Notes
A Claude account The Free plan covers chat, web search, memory and up to five Projects.
Claude Pro, for Cowork Cowork is on paid plans only (Pro, Max, Team, Enterprise). Anthropic lists Pro at US$20 a month, or US$17 a month billed annually, excluding tax. UK buyers are charged a local amount at checkout. Third-party UK guides put it at roughly £18–£21 a month including VAT at time of writing, but check the figure on your own checkout page before you pay.
Claude Desktop (macOS or Windows) Needed if you want Claude working in folders on your computer. Cowork also runs on the web and mobile for Pro, Max and Team, but local folders only work on desktop.
20 minutes and a blank note You will write a short rules note in Step 1.

One thing to check first. Anthropic started rolling out a "new Claude experience" on 16 September 2026, beginning with Pro and Max. It merges chat and Cowork into one conversation. If your message box no longer offers separate Chat and Cowork options, you have it. Several steps below differ depending on which version you see, and each one says where.

Step 1 — Write your rules note, then put it in Instructions for Claude

A rules note is a short plain-text document, ideally under a page, that says how you want Claude to work for you in every conversation. Write it in a normal document first so you keep a copy you control. Cover four things:

Then paste it in. Click your initials in the lower left, choose Settings, and fill in Instructions for Claude. In the new experience this lives under Settings > General, and it replaces the old Cowork Global instructions box, so one note now covers both. These instructions apply to every conversation you have.

Keep it short. Rules for one client or one project belong in Step 3, not here.

Step 2 — Confirm how search works on your account

Web search is included on every plan, but how you switch it on depends on your version:

Your version What to do
New Claude experience There is no switch. Claude searches when it decides it will help. For a longer, multi-source research run, type /deep-research or use the + button.
Older interface Click + in the lower left of the message box and select Web search.
Team or Enterprise An Owner or Primary Owner has to enable it first under Organization settings > Capabilities.

Test it by asking something that only current information can answer, such as "What changed in Claude's release notes this month? Link your sources." If the reply has no links, search did not run.

Two costs to know about. On Free, searches count towards a usage limit that resets every five hours. And pasting a long article in for Claude to summarise uses a lot more of the conversation's space than asking a question about it does.

Step 3 — Create one Project for your main recurring job

A Project is a workspace with its own chat history, uploaded files and instructions. Start with one, for the work you repeat most often, and leave the other projects until later.

  1. Go to claude.ai/projects and click + New Project.
  2. Enter a name and description. Anthropic's help article says Claude can't see either of these, so don't put instructions in them.
  3. Click Set project instructions and add only what is specific to this work, such as the client, the format and the standing brief. Your Step 1 rules already apply here, so you don't need to repeat them.
  4. Use the + on the right to upload reference files, like a style guide, a price list or past examples you were happy with.

On paid plans, when a Project's files grow close to the model's context limit, Claude switches to retrieval mode automatically so the Project can hold more. In the new experience, Projects appear in Recents with your other chats.

Step 4 — Give Cowork a folder, and choose how much it can do alone

Cowork is the agentic side of Claude. It works through multi-step tasks, reads and writes files, and can use a browser. In the older interface you choose Cowork in the message box. In the new experience you simply ask for the task.

On desktop, three settings matter before the first real task:

Save a copy of your rules note in the working folder too. Cowork supports folder-level instructions, and third-party guides say Claude reads a file named CLAUDE.md at the top of the folder. Check that this behaves as you expect on your version before you rely on it.

Step 5 — Pick the model last

Choose the model in the model picker, which hasn't moved in the new experience. Pick it according to the task in front of you, not by habit.

Model Use it for Notes at time of writing
Sonnet 5.5 Everyday drafting, summaries and routine Cowork tasks Anthropic describes it as its best balance of speed and intelligence. A sensible default.
Opus 5.5 Long, ambiguous or high-stakes work Released 22 September 2026. Anthropic says it performs at Fable 5.1's level on most work.
Haiku 4.5 Quick, simple questions The fastest, with an older knowledge cutoff.
Fable 5.1 The hardest reasoning, if Opus 5.5 falls short On Pro it is not included in your plan's limits and runs on paid usage credits.

Check it worked

Run these three tests in a new conversation inside your Project:

  1. Ask "What standing instructions are you following here?" The answer should mention points from both your rules note and your project instructions.
  2. Ask a question that needs today's information. The answer should include source links.
  3. Give Cowork a harmless task, such as "List the files in my working folder and draft a one-line description of each." On Manual, you should be asked for approval before it acts.

If any of these fails, go back to the layer that test covers before you change anything else.

What to skip

Guardrails

Sources

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