Explain how claude-mem captures observations, when memory injection kicks in, and where data lives. Use when the user asks "how does claude-mem work?" or "what is this thing doing?".
Installs into .claude/skills of the current project.
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---
name: how-it-works
description: Explain how claude-mem captures observations, when memory injection kicks in, and where data lives. Use when the user asks "how does claude-mem work?" or "what is this thing doing?".
---
# How claude-mem works
## What it does
Every Read, Edit, and Bash that Claude makes turns into a compressed observation. Observations get summarized at session end. Relevant ones get auto-injected into future prompts so the next session starts with context from the last one — no re-explaining the codebase, no re-discovering decisions.
## When it kicks in
Memory injection starts on your second session in a project.
The first session in a fresh project seeds memory; subsequent sessions receive auto-injected context for relevant past work. Run `/learn-codebase` if you want to front-load the entire repo into memory in a single pass (~5 minutes, optional).
## Where data lives
Everything stays in ~/.claude-mem on this machine.
Nothing leaves your machine except calls to whichever AI provider you configured for compression (Claude / OpenRouter / Gemini). Local installs contact cmem.ai once, at signup, to create the sign-in link; nothing else is sent to cmem.ai. The SQLite database, vector index, logs, and settings all live under that directory and are removed cleanly on `npx claude-mem uninstall`.
