Anthropic Official Curriculum · 2025 Edition
Master Prompt Engineering
for Claude AI
11 in-depth lessons — from basic structure to advanced multi-prompt architectures. Unlock Claude's full potential with techniques used by top AI engineers.
11
Lessons
3
Skill Levels
50+
Prompt Examples
Free
Always
Works with all Claude models
Claude Opus 4
Claude Sonnet 4.5
Claude Haiku 4.5
Claude 3 Opus
Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Claude 3 Haiku
What you'll learn
Everything from zero to advanced
Build real-world prompting skills with hands-on examples, before/after comparisons, and industry use cases.
Prompt Structure Fundamentals
Understand how Claude processes instructions and build prompts that always get the response you need.
Role & Persona Prompting
Assign expert identities to Claude to unlock domain-specific knowledge and communication styles.
Chain-of-Thought Reasoning
Make Claude think step-by-step to solve complex problems, math, and multi-step logic accurately.
XML Structuring & Formatting
Use XML tags to separate data from instructions and control output format with precision.
Hallucination Prevention
Techniques to ensure Claude stays grounded in facts and admits uncertainty appropriately.
Prompt Chaining & Tool Use
Build multi-step AI workflows by chaining prompts and integrating external tools and APIs.
Curriculum
11 lessons across 3 levels
Structured by difficulty. Each lesson builds on the last with real examples and exercises.
Beginner
Core Foundations
Learn how Claude reads prompts, why clarity matters, and how to assign expert roles that shape every response.
Intermediate
Structuring & Reasoning
Separate data from instructions with XML, format outputs precisely, make Claude think step-by-step, and use few-shot examples.
Advanced
Production Prompting
Eliminate hallucinations, build complex industry-grade prompts, and go beyond single-turn interactions.
Appendix
Beyond Standard Prompting
Advanced architectures for real-world AI systems: chaining prompts and integrating external tools.
All Lessons
Jump in anywhere
Basic Prompt Structure
Understand how Claude parses your messages. Learn the anatomy of a great prompt: role, context, task, and format.
Being Clear and Direct
Why vague prompts fail. Techniques for writing precise, unambiguous instructions that eliminate guesswork.
Assigning Roles
Give Claude a persona — domain expert, writing coach, Socratic tutor — to unlock specialized knowledge modes.
Separating Data from Instructions
Use XML tags and delimiters to cleanly separate your instructions from the data Claude should process.
Formatting Output & Speaking for Claude
Control response structure with JSON, Markdown, lists, and prefill techniques. Make Claude start responses your way.
Precognition: Thinking Step by Step
Unlock Chain-of-Thought reasoning. Make Claude reason before answering to dramatically improve accuracy.
Using Examples (Few-Shot Prompting)
Show, don't just tell. Learn zero-shot, one-shot, and few-shot techniques to guide format and style.
Avoiding Hallucinations
Critical production technique. Teach Claude to say "I don't know" and stay grounded in provided context only.
Building Complex Prompts
Combine all techniques for production systems. Industry use cases: chatbots, legal, financial services, and code.
Chaining Prompts
Build multi-step AI pipelines. Pass outputs as inputs, create reasoning chains, and design agentic workflows.
Tool Use & Search/Retrieval
Extend Claude beyond its training data. Connect to APIs, databases, and real-time search with function calling.
Prerequisites
What you need to start
Claude Access
A free or Pro account at claude.ai, or API access via Anthropic Console. The course works with any Claude model.
Reading English
No programming experience required for Beginner and Intermediate levels. Advanced concepts benefit from basic Python.
Curiosity to Experiment
Prompt engineering is learned by doing. Each lesson has hands-on exercises. Run the examples as you read them.
Ready to write prompts that actually work?
Start with Chapter 1 — it takes 12 minutes and you'll immediately see the difference.
Begin Chapter 1 →