15+ Examples
Claude Cowork Use Cases
Real-world examples and workflows to inspire your automation
File ManagementBeginner2-5 minutes
Smart File Organization
Automatically sort, rename, and organize files across your computer based on type, date, project, or custom criteria.
What You Can Do:
- Sort Downloads folder by file type into subfolders
- Rename photos with date and location metadata
- Organize project files by client name
- Archive old files by year
- Find and remove duplicate files
Sample Prompt:
“Organize my Downloads folder: move all PDFs to a "Documents" folder, images to "Images", and videos to "Videos". Rename each file to include today's date as a prefix.”Document CreationIntermediate5-15 minutes
Document Synthesis & Reports
Combine information from multiple sources into cohesive, formatted reports and documents.
What You Can Do:
- Merge multiple meeting notes into a summary
- Create executive summary from research papers
- Compile weekly status reports from various inputs
- Generate project documentation from scattered files
Sample Prompt:
“Read all the meeting notes in my "Meetings" folder from this month and create a comprehensive summary document highlighting key decisions, action items, and deadlines.”Data ProcessingIntermediate3-10 minutes
Excel Spreadsheets with Formulas
Create professional spreadsheets with working formulas, formatting, and data analysis.
What You Can Do:
- Budget tracking spreadsheet with categories
- Sales report with pivot table summaries
- Project timeline with milestone tracking
- Expense reports with auto-calculations
Sample Prompt:
“Create an Excel spreadsheet for tracking my monthly expenses. Include categories (Food, Transport, Entertainment, Utilities, Other), a column for amounts, and formulas to calculate totals by category and grand total. Format it professionally.”Document CreationIntermediate10-20 minutes
PowerPoint Presentations
Generate complete presentations with slides, content, and professional formatting.
What You Can Do:
- Quarterly business review presentation
- Product launch deck
- Training materials and tutorials
- Conference talk slides
Sample Prompt:
“Create a 10-slide PowerPoint presentation about remote work best practices. Include an intro slide, 7 content slides with key points and examples, a summary slide, and a Q&A slide. Use a professional blue color scheme.”ResearchAdvanced15-30 minutes
Research Compilation
Gather, organize, and synthesize research from multiple documents and sources.
What You Can Do:
- Literature review from academic papers
- Competitive analysis from multiple reports
- Market research summary
- Technical specification comparison
Sample Prompt:
“Analyze the 5 PDF research papers in my "Research" folder about AI trends. Create a summary document that identifies common themes, conflicting findings, and key statistics. Include citations.”CommunicationBeginner2-5 minutes
Email Drafting & Organization
Draft professional emails and manage inbox organization through Gmail integration.
What You Can Do:
- Draft responses to common inquiries
- Create email templates for different scenarios
- Summarize long email threads
- Compose follow-up messages
Sample Prompt:
“Read the email thread about the Q4 project proposal and draft a professional follow-up email summarizing the key points discussed and proposing next steps. Keep it concise but thorough.”ProductivityIntermediate5-15 minutes
Meeting Preparation
Prepare for meetings by compiling relevant documents, creating agendas, and summarizing background information.
What You Can Do:
- Create meeting agendas from topics list
- Compile briefing documents
- Summarize previous meeting notes
- Prepare talking points from data
Sample Prompt:
“I have a client meeting tomorrow. Review the files in my "ClientX" folder and create a briefing document with project status, recent updates, pending items, and suggested talking points.”Data ProcessingIntermediate5-10 minutes
Data Transformation & Cleanup
Clean, transform, and reformat data files for analysis or import into other systems.
What You Can Do:
- Convert CSV formats between systems
- Clean messy data with inconsistent formatting
- Merge multiple data files into one
- Extract specific columns from large datasets
Sample Prompt:
“I have 5 CSV files from different sales regions. Merge them into a single file, standardize the date format to YYYY-MM-DD, remove any duplicate entries, and sort by date.”Document CreationBeginner5-10 minutes
Content Writing
Create various types of written content from blog posts to documentation.
What You Can Do:
- Blog posts and articles
- Product descriptions
- User documentation
- Marketing copy
Sample Prompt:
“Write a 1000-word blog post about the benefits of AI assistants in the workplace. Include an introduction, 4 main points with examples, and a conclusion. Save it as a formatted Word document.”Data ProcessingIntermediate10-20 minutes
Financial Tracking & Analysis
Track expenses, create budgets, and analyze financial data.
What You Can Do:
- Monthly budget tracking
- Expense categorization
- Invoice processing
- Financial report generation
Sample Prompt:
“Review the receipts and bank statements in my "Finances" folder for January. Create a detailed expense report categorized by type (groceries, utilities, entertainment, etc.) with totals and a pie chart breakdown.”DevelopmentAdvanced10-15 minutes
Code Documentation
Generate documentation for code projects through GitHub integration.
What You Can Do:
- README file generation
- API documentation
- Code comments and explanations
- Changelog compilation
Sample Prompt:
“Analyze my GitHub repository at [repo-url] and create a comprehensive README.md file with project description, installation instructions, usage examples, and contribution guidelines.”File ManagementBeginner2-5 minutes
Batch File Processing
Apply the same operation to many files at once.
What You Can Do:
- Rename hundreds of files with a pattern
- Convert file formats in bulk
- Add watermarks to images
- Extract text from multiple PDFs
Sample Prompt:
“Rename all 50 photos in my "Vacation" folder using the pattern "Hawaii_2024_001.jpg", "Hawaii_2024_002.jpg", etc., and move any videos to a separate "Videos" subfolder.”Document CreationIntermediate5-10 minutes
Template Creation
Create reusable document templates for common needs.
What You Can Do:
- Invoice templates
- Report templates
- Proposal templates
- Contract templates
Sample Prompt:
“Create a professional invoice template in Excel with my business name, client info fields, line items table with quantity/price/total columns, subtotal, tax calculation, and grand total. Make it print-ready.”File ManagementIntermediate5-15 minutes
Google Drive Management
Organize and manage files in Google Drive through the integration.
What You Can Do:
- Organize Drive folders
- Download and process Drive files
- Upload organized files to Drive
- Sync local and cloud folders
Sample Prompt:
“Download all files from my "Work Projects" folder in Google Drive, organize them by project name into local folders, and create an index document listing all files with their locations.”ResearchIntermediate5-15 minutes
Data Extraction from Documents
Extract specific information from documents and compile it into structured formats.
What You Can Do:
- Extract contact info from business cards
- Pull data from invoices into spreadsheet
- Extract quotes from research papers
- Compile statistics from reports
Sample Prompt:
“Read all the PDF invoices in my "Invoices" folder and create an Excel spreadsheet with columns for vendor name, invoice number, date, amount, and status. Sort by date.”Quick Reference by Category
Document Creation
Data Processing
Communication
Productivity
Development
Ready to Try These Use Cases?
Start with our tutorial to set up Claude Cowork, then come back to try these examples.