Claude Skills, Plugins and Marketplaces

What Skills Are

Skills are packages of instructions plus supporting files that teach the model how to do a task well. Instead of guessing, the agent loads a skill and follows its procedure, references and examples.

Plugins

Plugins bundle skills with configuration and hooks so a whole workflow installs together. Installing a plugin makes its skills available in every session.

Marketplaces

Marketplaces are catalogs of plugins. You register one once, then install any plugin it lists.

claude plugin marketplace add obra/superpowers-marketplace
claude plugin install superpowers

Finding Skills

Community collections such as the Anthropic skills repository and the Superpowers marketplace publish tested skills for testing, debugging, planning and documentation. Check the collectible's README before installing.

Key Points

• Skills add reusable know-how to the agent.
• Plugins ship skills plus hooks as one unit.
• Marketplaces make plugins easy to install.
• Verify a skill collection is maintained before relying on it.