Create plugins

Create custom plugins to extend Claude Code with skills, agents, hooks, and MCP servers.

Plugins let you extend Claude Code with custom functionality that can be shared across projects and teams. This guide covers creating your own plugins with skills, agents, hooks, and MCP servers.

Looking to install existing plugins? See Discover and install plugins. For complete technical specifications, see Plugins reference.

When to use plugins vs standalone configuration

Claude Code supports two ways to add custom skills, agents, and hooks:

Approach	Skill names	Best for
Standalone (.claude/ directory)	/hello	Personal workflows, project-specific customizations, quick experiments
Plugins (directories with .claude-plugin/plugin.json)	/plugin-name:hello	Sharing with teammates, distributing to community, versioned releases, reusable across projects

Use standalone configuration when:

• You’re customizing Claude Code for a single project
• The configuration is personal and doesn’t need to be shared
• You’re experimenting with skills or hooks before packaging them
• You want short skill names like /hello or /review

Use plugins when:

• You want to share functionality with your team or community
• You need the same skills/agents across multiple projects
• You want version control and easy updates for your extensions
• You’re distributing through a marketplace
• You’re okay with namespaced skills like /my-plugin:hello (namespacing prevents conflicts between plugins)

Start with standalone configuration in .claude/ for quick iteration, then convert to a plugin when you’re ready to share.

Quickstart

This quickstart walks you through creating a plugin with a custom skill. You’ll create a manifest (the configuration file that defines your plugin), add a skill, and test it locally using the --plugin-dir flag.

Prerequisites

• Claude Code installed and authenticated
• Claude Code version 1.0.33 or later (run claude --version to check)

If you don’t see the /plugin command, update Claude Code to the latest version. See Troubleshooting for upgrade instructions.

Create your first plugin

1. Create the plugin directory

   Every plugin lives in its own directory containing a manifest and your skills, agents, or hooks. Create one now:

   mkdir my-first-plugin
   
2. Create the plugin manifest

   The manifest file at .claude-plugin/plugin.json defines your plugin’s identity: its name, description, and version. Claude Code uses this metadata to display your plugin in the plugin manager.

   Create the .claude-plugin directory inside your plugin folder:

   mkdir my-first-plugin/.claude-plugin
   

   Then create my-first-plugin/.claude-plugin/plugin.json with this content:

   my-first-plugin/.claude-plugin/plugin.json

   {
   "name": "my-first-plugin",
   "description": "A greeting plugin to learn the basics",
   "version": "1.0.0",
   "author": {
   "name": "Your Name"
   }
   }
   

   Field	Purpose
   name	Unique identifier and skill namespace. Skills are prefixed with this (e.g., /my-first-plugin:hello).
   description	Shown in the plugin manager when browsing or installing plugins.
   version	Track releases using semantic versioning.
   author	Optional. Helpful for attribution.

   For additional fields like homepage, repository, and license, see the full manifest schema.

3. Add a skill

   Skills live in the skills/ directory. Each skill is a folder containing a SKILL.md file. The folder name becomes the skill name, prefixed with the plugin’s namespace (hello/ in a plugin named my-first-plugin creates /my-first-plugin:hello).

   Create a skill directory in your plugin folder:

   mkdir -p my-first-plugin/skills/hello
   

   Then create my-first-plugin/skills/hello/SKILL.md with this content:

   my-first-plugin/skills/hello/SKILL.md

   ---
   description: Greet the user with a friendly message
   disable-model-invocation: true
   ---
   
   Greet the user warmly and ask how you can help them today.
   
4. Test your plugin

   Run Claude Code with the --plugin-dir flag to load your plugin:

   claude --plugin-dir ./my-first-plugin
   

   Once Claude Code starts, try your new command:

   /my-first-plugin:hello
   

   You’ll see Claude respond with a greeting. Run /help to see your command listed under the plugin namespace.

   Why namespacing? Plugin skills are always namespaced (like /greet:hello) to prevent conflicts when multiple plugins have skills with the same name.

   To change the namespace prefix, update the name field in plugin.json.

5. Add skill arguments

   Make your skill dynamic by accepting user input. The $ARGUMENTS placeholder captures any text the user provides after the skill name.

   Update your hello.md file:

   my-first-plugin/commands/hello.md

   ---
   description: Greet the user with a personalized message
   ---
   
   # Hello Command
   
   Greet the user named "$ARGUMENTS" warmly and ask how you can help them today. Make the greeting personal and encouraging.
   

   Restart Claude Code to pick up the changes, then try the command with your name:

   /my-first-plugin:hello Alex
   

   Claude will greet you by name. For more on passing arguments to skills, see Skills.

You’ve successfully created and tested a plugin with these key components:

• Plugin manifest (.claude-plugin/plugin.json): describes your plugin’s metadata
• Commands directory (commands/): contains your custom skills
• Skill arguments ($ARGUMENTS): captures user input for dynamic behavior

The --plugin-dir flag is useful for development and testing. When you’re ready to share your plugin with others, see Create and distribute a plugin marketplace.

Plugin structure overview

You’ve created a plugin with a skill, but plugins can include much more: custom agents, hooks, MCP servers, and LSP servers.

Common mistake: Don’t put commands/, agents/, skills/, or hooks/ inside the .claude-plugin/ directory. Only plugin.json goes inside .claude-plugin/. All other directories must be at the plugin root level.

Directory	Location	Purpose
.claude-plugin/	Plugin root	Contains plugin.json manifest (optional if components use default locations)
commands/	Plugin root	Skills as Markdown files
agents/	Plugin root	Custom agent definitions
skills/	Plugin root	Agent Skills with SKILL.md files
hooks/	Plugin root	Event handlers in hooks.json
.mcp.json	Plugin root	MCP server configurations
.lsp.json	Plugin root	LSP server configurations for code intelligence

Next steps: Ready to add more features? Jump to Develop more complex plugins to add agents, hooks, MCP servers, and LSP servers. For complete technical specifications of all plugin components, see Plugins reference.

Develop more complex plugins

Once you’re comfortable with basic plugins, you can create more sophisticated extensions.

Add Skills to your plugin

Plugins can include Agent Skills to extend Claude’s capabilities. Skills are model-invoked: Claude automatically uses them based on the task context.

Add a skills/ directory at your plugin root with Skill folders containing SKILL.md files:

my-plugin/
├── .claude-plugin/
│   └── plugin.json
└── skills/
    └── code-review/
        └── SKILL.md

Each SKILL.md needs frontmatter with name and description fields, followed by instructions:

---
name: code-review
description: Reviews code for best practices and potential issues. Use when reviewing code, checking PRs, or analyzing code quality.
---

When reviewing code, check for:
1. Code organization and structure
2. Error handling
3. Security concerns
4. Test coverage

After installing the plugin, restart Claude Code to load the Skills. For complete Skill authoring guidance including progressive disclosure and tool restrictions, see Agent Skills.

Add LSP servers to your plugin

For common languages like TypeScript, Python, and Rust, install the pre-built LSP plugins from the official marketplace. Create custom LSP plugins only when you need support for languages not already covered.

LSP (Language Server Protocol) plugins give Claude real-time code intelligence. If you need to support a language that doesn’t have an official LSP plugin, you can create your own by adding an .lsp.json file to your plugin:

.lsp.json

{
  "go": {
    "command": "gopls",
    "args": ["serve"],
    "extensionToLanguage": {
      ".go": "go"
    }
  }
}

Users installing your plugin must have the language server binary installed on their machine.

For complete LSP configuration options, see LSP servers.

Organize complex plugins

For plugins with many components, organize your directory structure by functionality. For complete directory layouts and organization patterns, see Plugin directory structure.

Test your plugins locally

Use the --plugin-dir flag to test plugins during development. This loads your plugin directly without requiring installation.

claude --plugin-dir ./my-plugin

As you make changes to your plugin, restart Claude Code to pick up the updates. Test your plugin components:

• Try your commands with /command-name
• Check that agents appear in /agents
• Verify hooks work as expected

You can load multiple plugins at once by specifying the flag multiple times:

claude --plugin-dir ./plugin-one --plugin-dir ./plugin-two

Debug plugin issues

If your plugin isn’t working as expected:

1. Check the structure: Ensure your directories are at the plugin root, not inside .claude-plugin/
2. Test components individually: Check each command, agent, and hook separately
3. Use validation and debugging tools: See Debugging and development tools for CLI commands and troubleshooting techniques

Share your plugins

When your plugin is ready to share:

1. Add documentation: Include a README.md with installation and usage instructions
2. Version your plugin: Use semantic versioning in your plugin.json
3. Create or use a marketplace: Distribute through plugin marketplaces for installation
4. Test with others: Have team members test the plugin before wider distribution

Once your plugin is in a marketplace, others can install it using the instructions in Discover and install plugins.

For complete technical specifications, debugging techniques, and distribution strategies, see Plugins reference.

Convert existing configurations to plugins

If you already have skills or hooks in your .claude/ directory, you can convert them into a plugin for easier sharing and distribution.

Migration steps

1. Create the plugin structure

   Create a new plugin directory:

   mkdir -p my-plugin/.claude-plugin
   

   Create the manifest file at my-plugin/.claude-plugin/plugin.json:

   my-plugin/.claude-plugin/plugin.json

   {
     "name": "my-plugin",
     "description": "Migrated from standalone configuration",
     "version": "1.0.0"
   }
   
2. Copy your existing files

   Copy your existing configurations to the plugin directory:

   # Copy commands
   cp -r .claude/commands my-plugin/
   
   # Copy agents (if any)
   cp -r .claude/agents my-plugin/
   
   # Copy skills (if any)
   cp -r .claude/skills my-plugin/
   
3. Migrate hooks

   If you have hooks in your settings, create a hooks directory:

   mkdir my-plugin/hooks
   

   Create my-plugin/hooks/hooks.json with your hooks configuration. Copy the hooks object from your .claude/settings.json or settings.local.json, since the format is the same. The command receives hook input as JSON on stdin, so use jq to extract the file path:

   my-plugin/hooks/hooks.json

   {
     "hooks": {
       "PostToolUse": [
         {
           "matcher": "Write|Edit",
           "hooks": [{ "type": "command", "command": "jq -r '.tool_input.file_path' | xargs npm run lint:fix" }]
         }
       ]
     }
   }
   
4. Test your migrated plugin

   Load your plugin to verify everything works:

   claude --plugin-dir ./my-plugin
   

   Test each component: run your commands, check agents appear in /agents, and verify hooks trigger correctly.

What changes when migrating

Standalone (.claude/)	Plugin
Only available in one project	Can be shared via marketplaces
Files in .claude/commands/	Files in plugin-name/commands/
Hooks in settings.json	Hooks in hooks/hooks.json
Must manually copy to share	Install with /plugin install

After migrating, you can remove the original files from .claude/ to avoid duplicates. The plugin version will take precedence when loaded.

Next steps

Now that you understand Claude Code’s plugin system, here are suggested paths for different goals:

For plugin users

• Discover and install plugins: browse marketplaces and install plugins
• Configure team marketplaces: set up repository-level plugins for your team

For plugin developers

• Create and distribute a marketplace: package and share your plugins
• Plugins reference: complete technical specifications
• Dive deeper into specific plugin components:
  • Skills: skill development details
  • Subagents: agent configuration and capabilities
  • Hooks: event handling and automation
  • MCP: external tool integration