Claude Skills Directory: Where to Find Skills
Claude Code skills are .md files stored locally at ~/.claude/skills/. When you invoke /skill-name, Claude Code reads that file and gains specialized context for the task. Here’s where to find skills and how to install them.
Built-in Skills
Claude Code ships with a set of official skills that cover common development tasks. These are available by default and don’t require manual installation. The primary built-in skills include:
- pdf — document text extraction, merging, form filling
- docx — Word document creation and manipulation
- pptx — PowerPoint presentation generation
- xlsx — spreadsheet operations with formula support
- tdd — test-driven development guidance
- frontend-design — UI component generation for React, Vue, Svelte
- canvas-design — visual asset generation
- supermemory — persistent knowledge base across sessions
To see which skills are available in your session, check your ~/.claude/skills/ directory:
ls ~/.claude/skills/
To load a skill’s full guidance, invoke it with a slash command:
/pdf
/tdd
/supermemory
Community Skills
The community maintains additional skills in public GitHub repositories. The best place to find community Claude Code skills:
- Search GitHub for
claude-code skills site:github.com - Browse the claude-code community discussions
- Check the awesome-claude-code community list
Community skills are .md files you clone or download and place in ~/.claude/skills/.
Installing a Community Skill
# Example: installing a skill from a GitHub repo
curl -o ~/.claude/skills/my-skill.md \
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/username/claude-skills/main/my-skill.md
# Or clone a skills collection
git clone https://github.com/username/claude-skills.git /tmp/claude-skills
cp /tmp/claude-skills/*.md ~/.claude/skills/
After installing, restart your Claude Code session and invoke the skill with /skill-name.
Finding Skills by Use Case
| Need | Skill |
|---|---|
| Extract text from PDFs | /pdf |
| Generate Word documents | /docx |
| Create presentations | /pptx |
| Spreadsheet automation | /xlsx |
| TDD workflows | /tdd |
| React/Vue component generation | /frontend-design |
| Generate icons and graphics | /canvas-design |
| Persistent cross-session memory | /supermemory |
| Browser automation testing | /webapp-testing |
| Build custom MCP servers | /skill-creator |
Evaluating Community Skills
Before adding a community skill:
- Read the skill file — it’s just Markdown, so you can review exactly what instructions it gives Claude
- Check the repository’s maintenance activity
- Look for clear usage examples in the README
- Test in a non-critical session first
Official skills from Anthropic are tested and maintained. Community skills vary in quality — reading the .md file directly is the fastest way to evaluate one.
Keeping Skills Updated
For official skills, update Claude Code:
npm update -g @anthropic-ai/claude-code
For community skills stored as Git repos, pull updates periodically:
git -C /path/to/skills-repo pull
cp /path/to/skills-repo/*.md ~/.claude/skills/
Related Reading
- Best Claude Skills for Developers in 2026 — Top skills every developer should know
- Claude Skills vs Prompts: Which Is Better? — Decide when skills beat plain prompts
- Claude Skills Auto Invocation: How It Works — How skills activate automatically
*Built by theluckystrike — More at zovo.one *