Claude Code overview

Learn about Claude Code, Anthropic's agentic coding tool that lives in your terminal and helps you turn ideas into code faster than ever before.

Get started in 30 seconds

Prerequisites:

Node.js 18 or newer
A Claude.ai (recommended) or Claude Console account

# Install Claude Code
npm install -g @anthropic-ai/claude-code

# Navigate to your project
cd your-awesome-project

# Start coding with Claude
claude
# You'll be prompted to log in on first use

That's it! You're ready to start coding with Claude. Continue with Quickstart (5 mins) →

(Got specific setup needs or hit issues? See advanced setup or troubleshooting.)

**New VS Code Extension (Beta)**: Prefer a graphical interface? Our new [VS Code extension](/en/docs/claude-code/vs-code) provides an easy-to-use native IDE experience without requiring terminal familiarity. Simply install from the marketplace and start coding with Claude directly in your sidebar.

What Claude Code does for you

Build features from descriptions: Tell Claude what you want to build in plain English. It will make a plan, write the code, and ensure it works.
Debug and fix issues: Describe a bug or paste an error message. Claude Code will analyze your codebase, identify the problem, and implement a fix.
Navigate any codebase: Ask anything about your team's codebase, and get a thoughtful answer back. Claude Code maintains awareness of your entire project structure, can find up-to-date information from the web, and with MCP can pull from external datasources like Google Drive, Figma, and Slack.
Automate tedious tasks: Fix fiddly lint issues, resolve merge conflicts, and write release notes. Do all this in a single command from your developer machines, or automatically in CI.

Why developers love Claude Code

Works in your terminal: Not another chat window. Not another IDE. Claude Code meets you where you already work, with the tools you already love.
Takes action: Claude Code can directly edit files, run commands, and create commits. Need more? MCP lets Claude read your design docs in Google Drive, update your tickets in Jira, or use your custom developer tooling.
Unix philosophy: Claude Code is composable and scriptable. tail -f app.log | claude -p "Slack me if you see any anomalies appear in this log stream" works. Your CI can run claude -p "If there are new text strings, translate them into French and raise a PR for @lang-fr-team to review".
Enterprise-ready: Use the Claude API, or host on AWS or GCP. Enterprise-grade security, privacy, and compliance is built-in.

Next steps

See Claude Code in action with practical examples Step-by-step guides for common workflows Solutions for common issues with Claude Code Add Claude Code to your IDE

Additional resources