What’s New With CRAFT?
A running look at what’s new and changed in CRAFT — the things worth knowing if you’re running CRAFT for Claude Cowork in your own projects. Major updates, new disciplines, where to find things, what changed and why.
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July 2026 release candidate — CRAFT picks the right model, and long work is resumable
The July release candidate adds two things worth knowing. CRAFT can now recommend which Claude Cowork model best fits the task in front of you — a quick read on how checkable, how long-horizon, and how well-defined the work is — and keeps that guidance grounded in a Model Research Log it refreshes, so it reflects today’s models rather than a stale rule of thumb. And long-running work no longer has to be either wide open or finished: a subproject can be suspended — paused with its state intact — and resumed in a later session. Also in this build: organizable session names so your Recent Chats stays navigable, a more reliable status footer from a new project’s first response, and a boot pass that surfaces any suspended subprojects. Free during the beta, no membership required — download it, drop it into your Cowork workspace, and say “Initialize a CRAFT session.”
Read the announcement →Download & try it →View releases on GitHub →
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The Beta — and the Founding Chef window — extends to December 31, 2026
The free public Beta and its Founding Chef sign-up window now run through December 31, 2026, instead of September 1. For you, nothing else moves: the framework stays free during the Beta with no login, no paywall, and no email gate, and anything you’ve downloaded stays yours. The reason for the change is told straight in the announcement — the old date was set in 2025 for the pre-Cowork version of CRAFT and was never recomputed after the framework was rebuilt for Claude Cowork, so it’s now been re-derived from the product’s actual late-June launch.
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Refreshed release candidate — a cleaner user edition
A new release candidate is live for CRAFT for Claude Cowork. It ships the full user-tier framework — CORE 17 + COWORK 74 recipes — in the new two-folder layout, with the persona system, personalization, the guided tutorial mode, and subprojects. This build also tightens what’s in the box: the kit now contains only user-facing content, with the framework’s internal administrative aids left out. Free during the beta, no membership required. Download it, unzip it, open the folder in Claude Cowork, and say “Initialize a CRAFT session.” New to CRAFT? Say “turn on tutorial mode.”
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A cleaner, safer way to upgrade — your work is never touched
CRAFT now ships in a two-folder layout that separates the framework (the read-only “CRAFT Core Files” folder) from your own work (the “CRAFT Project Files” folder). To move to a new version, you download the release and drag its “CRAFT Core Files” folder over the old one — your operating system replaces the framework files, and nothing in your work folder changes. CRAFT includes a built-in upgrade check you run before and after the swap: it confirms the new framework’s files are intact and proves that none of your work was altered. Keep the previous “CRAFT Core Files” folder and you can roll back at any time by restoring it. No rebuilding your project, no hand-merging files — then start a fresh session to pick up the new version.
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CRAFT for Claude Cowork is now in public beta — free
The first release candidate is live: the full user-tier CRAFT (CORE + 70 COWORK recipes), the persona system, personalization, a guided tutorial mode, and subprojects — free during the beta, no membership required. Download it, unzip it, open the folder in Claude Cowork, and say “Initialize a CRAFT session.” New to CRAFT? Say “turn on tutorial mode.”
Download & try it →View releases on GitHub →Read the announcement →
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CRAFT is on the Beta-2 release rail
If you’ve been running CRAFT, you’re now on Beta-2 — the release rail that follows Cowork’s arrival as the single CRAFT product. The site, the recipes, the cookbooks, and the framework anchors all reflect that. The pre-Cowork bits — three flavors, the cross-platform language, file-attachment workflows — are gone. What you see is what you run, and the version you’re on is the one shipping.
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Pattern 21 — your LOCKED files now expect byte-preservation
If you LOCK specs, recipes, or pages in your CRAFT project, there’s a new rule for what comes next. Pattern 21 (and its 21b refinement) says LOCKED state stays byte-identical through subsequent edits — silent rewrites are out. Need to change something? Author a revision-delta block stating what changed, why, the BLESS source, and the scope. Old patterns of “just edit and move on” don’t pass review anymore.
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Recipes now carry lifecycle stages so you know what to trust
Browsing the recipe library got easier. Every recipe now carries a lifecycle stage — Experimental, Tested, Official, or Deprecated — that tells you how battle-tested it is before you bring it into your work. AI sessions reading the stage adjust trust accordingly without inspecting the recipe body for hints. If you’ve ever pulled a half-baked recipe by accident, this is the change that fixes that class of mistake.
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Your CLAUDE.md file is now spec-defined
Every CRAFT project has a CLAUDE.md that the AI reads on session boot. That file now has a written contract — required sections, optional sections, behavioral-directive encoding rules. If your project predates the spec, sessions will still work, but your CLAUDE.md may want a tune-up to match the structure new projects start from. The benefit: every session in every project opens with the same orientation pass.