Anthropic knowledge-work plugins

What it is

Knowledge Work Plugins is Anthropic’s repository of plugins that set Claude up for one job function. A plugin bundles skills, the know-how Claude draws on, with slash commands and connectors. Connectors link Claude to the tools that job uses, such as a CRM, a chat app or a data warehouse. The README says they are built for Claude Cowork and also work in Claude Code. The repository is also a plugin marketplace named knowledge-work-plugins. Nearly all of it is Markdown and JSON, so you can read what a plugin tells Claude to do before you install it.

1. You install a plugin and sign in to your tools
2. You type a slash command, or describe the job
3. Claude loads the skill and reads your connected tools
4. Claude drafts the work: a brief, a query, a report
5. Connector settings decide what Claude may change

The README’s table names 11 plugins, but the marketplace file read on 2 November 2026 lists 123. Twenty-two keep their files in the repository: 17 built by Anthropic and five by partners (Slack, Apollo, Common Room, Tribe AI and Zoom). The other 101 point to their makers’ own repositories, each pinned to one commit. Anthropic Agent Skills (anthropics/skills) is a different repository. It holds single skills, such as the Word, Excel, PowerPoint and PDF tools and creative examples, packed into two plugins, and its README says they are for demonstration and education. Here each plugin is a bundle for one role, with connectors to your tools attached.

Who it suits

People who already work in Claude Cowork or Claude Code and want Claude to know their role’s routines, from call prep to month-end close. Sales, legal, finance, data, marketing, support, product, HR, operations, design and engineering each have a plugin, and so do small-business owners and life-science researchers. The README calls the plugins generic starting points that pay off once you add your own tools, terms and processes.

Skip it if you want one self-contained skill, since Anthropic Agent Skills fits that better. Skip it too on a free Claude plan: the Help Center says plugins are for paid plans.

Where to use it

The README names two places: Cowork, where plugins install from claude.com/plugins, and Claude Code, where you add the marketplace from the terminal. The Help Center adds that plugins also work in chat on the web and in Claude Desktop’s Chat tab, where skills and commands run but hooks and sub-agents do not. A plugin you add in Claude is saved to your account, so it shows up in Claude Code when you sign in with the same account.

Anthropic’s other two plugins have no remote connector. The pdf-viewer plugin opens PDFs in a live viewer, where you annotate, fill and sign them through a local server. The last, cowork-plugin-management, builds a new plugin or changes an installed one.

How to set it up

Get it saves a zip of Mindket’s setup notes in your downloads folder, with the Cowork and Claude Code steps taken from Anthropic’s README and Help Center. Pick the plugin for your job first.

1. In Cowork or chat, open Customize in the left sidebar, then Plugins, and browse the list. Pick a plugin and click Add. In Cowork, open the Cowork tab first.
2. In Claude Code, add the marketplace, then install a plugin from it with the two lines below.
3. Sign in to the connectors the plugin lists. In Claude Code, /mcp shows the ones that need it.
4. Type / to see the plugin’s skills, or type /plugin-name:command.

claude plugin marketplace add anthropics/knowledge-work-plugins
claude plugin install sales@knowledge-work-plugins

Cowork can also take this repository as a marketplace: Plugins, Add, Add marketplace, Add from a repository, then anthropics/knowledge-work-plugins. Claude Code turns auto-update on by default for Anthropic’s official marketplaces, and its docs name this one as an exception. Plugins from it stay at the version you installed until you update them or turn auto-update on in /plugin, under Marketplaces.

claude plugin update sales@knowledge-work-plugins
claude plugin uninstall sales@knowledge-work-plugins
claude plugin marketplace remove knowledge-work-plugins

How to use it

Start with the plugin’s first-run skill where it has one. After that, ask for the job in plain words, or type the command. The README’s own examples are /sales:call-prep and /data:write-query.

The legal plugin reads your playbook from a file named legal.local.md. In Cowork, save it in a folder you shared with Cowork. In Claude Code, save it in the project’s .claude folder. To tune any installed plugin in Cowork, open it and click Customize. Claude then opens a task that adjusts its skills and connectors with you.

Example

A salesperson sends you an NDA from a prospect. In Cowork, you attach the file and type:

/legal:triage-nda

Claude screens the NDA against the playbook in legal.local.md, or against market-standard defaults when you have none, and says which it used. Back comes a triage report: a GREEN, YELLOW or RED label, the parties, term and governing law, and a table of screening results. Each issue comes with its risk and a suggested fix, then a next step. RED means do not sign. The skill adds that it assists with legal work and gives no legal advice.

For newcomers and experts

If you are new. A plugin is a folder of instructions, not a program. Claude reads them when your request matches. Pick one plugin for the work you do most, connect a single tool and run its first-run skill. The sales skills also work with nothing connected: upload an export or paste your notes.

For experts. Skills name a category such as the CRM or the chat tool, so you can swap a connector by editing .mcp.json without rewriting them. The sales skills read field and picklist names from your live CRM instead of assuming a vendor’s, and they treat email, chat and transcripts as data, never as instructions. A scheduled run takes only the actions you set it up for. In Cowork, the cowork-plugin-management plugin builds a new plugin through a five-phase conversation and hands back a .plugin file. A nightly workflow opens a pull request to move an outside entry’s pin when its maker’s repository has moved on, and a Claude policy scan must pass before the new pin merges.

Good to know

What a plugin can reach depends on what you connect to it.

• Data path: connectors are remote servers, most of them run by the service itself. Microsoft 365, PubMed, bioRxiv, ChEMBL and ClinicalTrials.gov use addresses on claude.com, and the bio-research README credits deepsense.ai for the last three. What each keeps is its operator’s policy. In Cowork, the Help Center says sessions run on Anthropic’s servers and local files Claude opens are processed there. In Claude Code, a plugin runs on your computer, MCP servers and hooks included
• Actions: the sales skills take an action you ask for through the connector, such as a record update, an email or a meeting. Each connector’s allow, ask or block setting is the limit. The small-business README says nothing is sent, posted, paid or written to your systems without your yes
• Injection: Anthropic names prompt injection as a Cowork risk, since Claude reads email, pages and records that others wrote
• Code that runs: bio-research ships Python scripts. Only the Nextflow ones reach the network, to NCBI, ENA, Docker Hub and nf-co.re. pdf-viewer starts a local server with npx -y and fetches PDFs from addresses you give it. The productivity dashboard loads the Inter font from Google Fonts when you open it, and the pages the small-business skills build load their fonts from there too
• Not advice: the legal README says its default playbook reflects U.S. positions (Delaware, New York, California) and must be adapted elsewhere. Finance output is for professional review, and a pdf-viewer signature is a picture, not a certified digital signature
• Blank connectors: Google Calendar, Gmail, Google Drive (in sales), Snowflake, Databricks and Benchling are listed without an address, so you connect them yourself
• License: Apache-2.0. The LICENSE file leaves its copyright line as the unfilled template and ends with one extra paragraph that is not part of the license terms. Partner folders carry their own LICENSE, MIT for four of the five and Apache-2.0 for Common Room, and each outside repository has its own