Claude Artifacts are anything Claude makes for you that you'd put in front of someone: a document, a deck, a design, a dashboard, or a small interactive tool. An artifact opens beside your conversation, you edit it by asking Claude or by working on it directly, and it's saved to the "Artifacts" tab in your sidebar. You can create artifacts on every plan, including Free. Every artifact starts private to you; with "Share" you open it up by link, by email invitation, or within your organization. According to Anthropic's help center, storage, connectors and link sharing start at Pro (support.claude.com, support.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026).
This article explains artifacts based on Anthropic's help center and docs as of October 30, 2026. This is not about Claude Cowork, Claude working as an agent in your files; that's covered in Claude Cowork: What It Does, Who It's For.
I collect the other building blocks and guides under Understanding and Using Claude Right.
What Claude Artifacts are
Since September 16, 2026, you can ask for a design, a deck, or a document in any conversation, including in Claude Code (support.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026). Claude also builds artifacts on its own when content is self-contained, typically over 15 lines, and likely to be reused outside the conversation: code, single-page websites, diagrams or small tools.
For work you plan to share, there are templates:
- Docs: living documents you write with Claude and your team
- Slides: presentations, exported to PowerPoint and PDF
- Design: mockups, prototypes, one-pagers and landing pages
- Dashboards (beta): charts from data platforms or connected apps, each showing its query
- Motion (beta): animated explainers, exported as MP4
Claude Design is now one of these templates. The standalone site claude.ai/design closes on December 14, 2026 (support.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026). Artifacts made in a chat before September 16, 2026 are now called "legacy artifacts": they keep working, but no new ones of that kind are created.
Which plans include artifacts
Source: support.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026. On Enterprise, Docs, Slides and Design have been on by default since October 15, 2026; an owner turns on Dashboards and Motion. What the free plan covers otherwise is in Claude Free Plan: What You Get.
How to create Claude Artifacts
- Check the setting: artifacts need "Cloud code execution and file creation", called "Create and edit files" in the updated settings layout. It's under Settings > Capabilities, or Organization settings > Capabilities on Team and Enterprise.
- Ask for it: request the result in a conversation, for example "Turn these notes into a deck for Thursday". Or select "Output" in the message box and choose a template, or start from the "Artifacts" tab.
- Edit: tell Claude what to change, or change it directly: type in a doc, edit a slide, move elements on a design canvas. In a document, highlight a passage, click "Edit with Claude" and type your request.
- Export: docs go to Word, PDF, Markdown and Google Docs, decks to PowerPoint, PDF and Google Slides, designs as a .zip, PDF, PowerPoint or HTML.
In the mobile apps you can ask for, view and edit artifacts, but you change sharing settings only on the web or in Claude Desktop (support.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026).
How to share and publish Claude Artifacts
Every artifact starts private. Open it, click "Share", choose under "Who has access" who can open it, and send the link. These are the options per plan (support.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026):
- Pro, Max, Ultra: "Only you" or "Anyone with the link", plus email invitations (beta).
- Team and Enterprise: specific people in your organization, the whole organization, or "Anyone with the link". The outside link is only available if an owner has turned on "External sharing" or allowed that artifact individually. Enterprise can also add groups.
For each person you choose "Can view", "Commenter" or "Can edit". Outside invitations work only for the invited email address, up to 50 per artifact, and pending invitations expire after 30 days.
The sources contradict each other on two points. First, Free: the help center table shows no sharing option for new artifacts on the Free plan, while the product page says "On Free, Pro, Max, and Ultra plans, you can share with anyone who has the link" (claude.com, as of October 30, 2026). Second, accounts: according to the help center, everyone needs a Claude account to open a shared artifact, except legacy artifacts published from a chat. The Claude Code docs, on the other hand, describe public links that open without signing in. So before you send a link outside, open it once in a private browser window.
Publishing legacy artifacts: on Free, Pro, Max and Ultra they show "Publish". Anyone can open the public link without a Claude account. "Get embed code" lets you embed the artifact on another website. "Unpublish" is final: you can't publish it again, and its stored data is deleted. On Team and Enterprise the option is called "Share & copy link".
Remixing: building on someone else's artifact
If you like a published artifact, you can build on it. According to the help center, this applies to legacy artifacts published from a chat, on Free, Pro, Max and Ultra: open the artifact, click "Copy", paste the code into a new conversation and describe what should change. Your version is separate, and the original stays untouched. Anthropic warns explicitly: only do this with artifacts from people you trust, and treat someone else's code like a file from an unknown sender (support.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026). For new artifacts the help center names no remix path. Someone invited with "Can edit" changes the original itself, not a version of their own.
Storage, connectors and Claude inside artifacts
Storage, connectors and calls to Claude turn artifacts into small apps. According to the help center, storage and connectors start at Pro, on the web and in Claude Desktop; for calls to Claude it names no plan restriction (support.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026):
- Storage: an artifact keeps data between sessions. With personal storage, everyone sees only their own entries, as in a journal. With shared storage, everyone sees the same data, as in a leaderboard. Limit: 20 MB per artifact, text only, no images or files.
- Connectors: an artifact can read from and write to your connected apps, such as Asana, Google Calendar or Slack. The first time, Claude shows which tools it will use and asks you to approve. Everyone connects their own apps, even for shared artifacts. The protocol behind them, MCP, is covered in Set Up a Claude MCP Server.
- Claude inside the artifact: an artifact can call Claude itself, say for a quiz or a writing coach. People using it sign in with their own Claude account, and usage counts against their plan, not yours. No API keys needed. New artifacts ask your permission the first time they want to use Claude.
Artifacts in Claude Code
Claude Code publishes artifacts too: a page at a private URL on claude.ai that updates as the session continues. This works on Pro, Max, Ultra, Team and Enterprise, only with a claude.ai login via /login, not with an API key or through Amazon Bedrock, Google Cloud's Agent Platform or Microsoft Foundry. /artifacts lists your pages. A page can be at most 16 MiB (code.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026). If you're just getting started with Claude Code, see Claude Code: A Guide for Beginners.
How I use artifacts
Claude Artifacts can provide working pages such as a website checklist or a question page. A shared database can exchange answers and progress between the interface and an agent. The important boundary is which data and write permissions you grant to that page.
Limits and privacy when you publish
Check these points from the help center before sharing outside (support.claude.com, support.claude.com, as of October 30, 2026):
- Shared storage is visible to everyone. Whoever built the artifact decides which data goes where. Don't enter anything sensitive until you've checked.
- Attachments come along. If you share a legacy chat artifact on Team or Enterprise, viewers also get access to the attachments and files in that chat.
- Not everything can go outside. Artifacts that use connectors or call Claude can't use "Anyone with the link". Neither can docs on Team and Enterprise for now.
- Viewers see their own data. An artifact with connectors uses the viewer's connections; without access, that part shows an error.
- Usage: artifacts count toward your normal usage limits; there's no separate allowance.
Frequently asked questions
Can I use Claude Artifacts for free?
Yes. According to Anthropic, creating artifacts and the Docs, Slides and Design templates work on the Free plan too. Storage, connectors and dashboards need a paid plan.
Where do I find my artifacts again?
In the "Artifacts" tab in Claude's sidebar. Everything you've made is there, independent of the conversation. In Claude Code, /artifacts lists your pages.
Do people need a Claude account to open a shared artifact?
According to Anthropic's help center, yes, except for legacy artifacts published from a chat. For public links from Claude Code, the docs describe access without signing in.
What happened to Claude Design?
Claude Design is now a template for artifacts, usable in any conversation and in Claude Code. The standalone site claude.ai/design closes on December 14, 2026. Move your design systems over before then.
Where to go from here
Ask Claude for an artifact built from material you already have, such as notes as a deck. Share it with one person you trust first and check what they see. How others use artifacts day to day is something we discuss in my community AI Employee Framework.
