Claude AI Skills: Custom Tools for Smarter Workflows

Amaresh Pelleti
Claude AI Skills: Custom Tools for Smarter Workflows

Claude just got a serious upgrade. With Agent Skills, Anthropic has introduced a whole new way to extend what Claude can do — not just through prompts, but through reusable, modular capabilities that work across Claude Code, the Claude API, and Claude Apps.

In simple terms, Skills turn Claude into a smarter, context-aware teammate. You can now package your expertise — whether it’s code review, document formatting, or data analysis — into something Claude can automatically learn, invoke, and share with others.

Let’s break down what Skills are, how they work, and why they matter for teams building with Claude.

🧠 What Are Claude Agent Skills?

Agent Skills are essentially custom “modules” that extend Claude’s abilities beyond normal chat.
They live in folders that include a SKILL.md file (which contains instructions and descriptions), plus optional supporting scripts, templates, or data files.

Think of it like this:
If you’ve ever wished Claude would “remember how you like your code reviewed,” or “always use your brand’s tone,” Skills make that possible.

Each Skill acts as a self-contained expertise package. Claude reads the instructions and decides when to apply them automatically — no more manual triggering with slash commands.

📘 Learn more: Claude Code Skills Documentation

⚙️ How Skills Work (and Why It’s Different)

The best part about Skills is that they’re model-invoked. Claude decides when to use them based on the context of your request — you don’t have to explicitly call them.

That’s a big shift from older “prompt-based” workflows.

Here’s how it works in practice:

  1. You create a folder for your Skill (personal or project-based).
  2. Add a SKILL.md file describing what it does and when to use it.
  3. Optionally include supporting scripts or templates.
  4. Claude automatically discovers and loads the Skill when needed.

For example, if your SKILL.md says:

description: Analyze Excel spreadsheets and generate pivot tables. Use when working with .xlsx files.

And you ask Claude:

“Can you summarize this Excel report and highlight key metrics?”

Claude will automatically invoke that Skill — no extra prompting needed.

📂 Types of Skills

You can organize Skills depending on how you want to use or share them:

1. Personal Skills

Stored in ~/.claude/skills/ — these are your private Skills for personal workflows or experiments.

2. Project Skills

Stored in .claude/skills/ — these are shared via Git and available to your entire team.
Perfect for enforcing coding standards, documentation templates, or project-specific automation.

3. Plugin Skills

These come bundled with Claude Code plugins, extending functionality automatically when installed.

Example: A plugin for PDF automation might include Skills for extraction, form filling, and merging.

🧰 How to Create Your First Skill

Let’s say you want Claude to automatically generate commit messages from staged changes.
Here’s what your folder could look like:

commit-helper/
└── SKILL.md

And the content of your SKILL.md:

---
name: generating-commit-messages
description: Generates clear commit messages from git diffs. Use when writing commit messages or reviewing staged changes.
---

# Generating Commit Messages

## Instructions
1. Run `git diff --staged` to see changes.
2. I’ll suggest a commit message with:
   - A concise summary
   - Details of changes
   - Affected components

Claude will now detect when you’re working with Git changes and apply this Skill automatically.

🔒 Controlling Access with allowed-tools

You can also limit which tools Claude can use when a Skill runs.
This is managed in the frontmatter with the allowed-tools field.

Example:

---
name: safe-file-reader
description: Read files without making changes. Use when you need read-only access.
allowed-tools: Read, Grep, Glob
---

This ensures Claude only performs read operations — useful for security-sensitive workflows.

🔍 Viewing and Testing Skills

You can ask Claude directly:

List all available Skills

or check manually:

ls ~/.claude/skills/

Then test your Skill naturally:

“Can you help me extract text from this PDF?”

If Claude uses your PDF Skill, it’s working. If not, you might need to refine the description to make it more specific.

⚡ Real-World Examples

Here are a few practical ways teams are already using Claude Skills:

  • Code Review – Enforce best practices and detect performance or security issues.
  • Data Analysis – Summarize CSVs, generate reports, and detect outliers.
  • Writing Assistance – Apply consistent tone and formatting for brand content.
  • Project Management – Automatically summarize progress or generate weekly updates.
  • Design Support – Generate UI descriptions or copy directly from design files.

You can explore real examples in the official GitHub repository:
👉 Claude Skills on GitHub

🤝 Sharing Skills with Your Team

Claude makes it easy to share Skills:

  1. Create your Skill in .claude/skills/
  2. Commit it to Git: git add .claude/skills/ git commit -m "Add team Skill for PDF processing" git push
  3. Team members pull the latest code — and the Skill is automatically available.

This workflow helps teams maintain a shared library of AI behaviors, just like reusable code modules.

🧩 Integration Across Claude Products

One of the coolest things about Skills is that they work everywhere:

  • Claude Apps: Users can enable or disable Skills in settings.
  • Claude Code: Developers can define custom Skills or use Anthropic’s prebuilt ones.
  • Claude API: Skills can now be added to message requests or managed via the new /v1/skills endpoint.

You can even use the “skill-creator” Skill to help you generate new ones — Claude guides you step-by-step through the creation process.

For more details, check Anthropic’s learning hub:
📘 Build with Claude

💡 Best Practices

To get the most out of Agent Skills:

  • Keep each Skill focused on one capability.
  • Write specific, contextual descriptions (include when and why to use).
  • Version your Skills in the SKILL.md file to track updates.
  • Test with your team and refine based on feedback.

Example of a good description:

description: Analyze Excel spreadsheets, create pivot tables, and generate charts. Use when working with .xlsx files or analyzing tabular data.

🚀 Final Thoughts

Claude Agent Skills are a big step toward personalized, modular AI.
They bridge the gap between static prompts and dynamic automation — letting you shape how Claude behaves, shares, and collaborates across projects.

Whether you’re a solo developer or part of an enterprise team, building and sharing Skills can save hours of repetitive setup and turn Claude into an extension of your workflow.

Anthropic is clearly thinking long-term here: Skills aren’t just a feature; they’re a foundation for agentic AI that adapts to how you work.

You Might Also Like

🛠️ Recommended Tools for Developers & Tech Pros

Save time, boost productivity, and work smarter with these AI-powered tools I personally use and recommend:

1️⃣ CopyOwl.ai – Research & Write Smarter
Write fully referenced reports, essays, or blogs in one click.
✅ 97% satisfaction • ✅ 10+ hrs saved/week • ✅ Academic citations

2️⃣ LoopCV.pro – Build a Job-Winning Resume
Create beautiful, ATS-friendly resumes in seconds — perfect for tech roles.
✅ One-click templates • ✅ PDF/DOCX export • ✅ Interview-boosting design

3️⃣ Speechify – Listen to Any Text
Turn articles, docs, or PDFs into natural-sounding audio — even while coding.
✅ 1,000+ voices • ✅ Works on all platforms • ✅ Used by 50M+ people

4️⃣ Jobright.ai – Automate Your Job Search
An AI job-search agent that curates roles, tailors resumes, finds referrers, and can apply for jobs—get interviews faster.
✅ AI agent, not just autofill – ✅ Referral insights – ✅ Faster, personalized matching