Most of what you ask Claude happens once: you ask, and it answers. But some work repeats on a clock, like a summary of your inbox every Monday morning or a look at the news in your field each day. Claude scheduled tasks hand that work to Claude, so it runs on time whether or not you remember to ask. Here is how they work, how to set one up, and what to think about before you let Claude act while nobody is watching.
What a scheduled task is
A scheduled task is a request you write once, the way you would ask for it in a conversation, plus a schedule. Claude runs the request every time the schedule comes around and keeps the results for you to review. Scheduled tasks are available on the paid plans: Pro, Max, Team, and Enterprise.
A task can run every hour, every day, on weekdays, or once a week. You can also create a task that only runs when you start it, which is handy for work you repeat often but not on a fixed timetable.
Where scheduled tasks run
Scheduled tasks run in the cloud. That means a task runs on its schedule even when your computer is asleep or the Claude desktop app is closed, and the results are waiting when you come back.
The exception is anything on your own machine. If a task needs local files or apps, it can only run on your computer, so that computer has to be on, with the desktop app open, when the task is due.
How to create a scheduled task
The easiest way is to ask. In a conversation, describe the task and when it should run. With your email connected, for example, you might ask Claude to summarize your inbox from the past week every Monday at 8 in the morning and list anything that needs a reply. Claude asks about anything that is unclear, then sets up the schedule for you.
You can also set one up yourself. Open Scheduled in the sidebar and choose New task. You give the task a name, write the prompt Claude will run each time, choose how often it runs, and pick the model it uses.
Good first tasks are ones that gather and summarize: a weekday digest of news about a topic you follow, a Monday summary of the documents that changed in a shared folder, or a Friday overview of your calendar for the week ahead.
Managing your tasks
Every task is listed on the Scheduled page, where you can see what is coming up next, what has already run, and the results of each run. Open a task to change its prompt or its schedule, pause it, resume it, or delete it once you no longer need it.
You do not have to wait for the schedule to find out whether a task works. Run it on demand, check the result, adjust the prompt, and run it again until the output is what you want.
Think before you automate
A scheduled task acts on your behalf while nobody is watching, with your connectors and your permissions. That changes the risk. In a normal conversation you see each step, and you can stop Claude the moment something looks wrong. A scheduled run usually happens with nobody there to check.
So start with tasks that only read and report, like summaries, digests, and checks. Pay attention to the approval setting when you create a task, because it decides what the task may do without asking you. Once a task has produced reliable results for a while, then consider letting it change things. It is the same principle as any other automation: give it only the access the job needs.
Conclusion
Claude scheduled tasks turn a request you would otherwise repeat by hand into work that runs on its own, in the cloud, on the schedule you choose. Create one by asking Claude or from the Scheduled page, test it with a run on demand, and start with tasks that only read. That way you get the time savings without handing over more control than the job needs.
Relevant Training
Scheduled tasks are covered in Customizing and Automating Claude, part of Cybrec's Claude AI training program, together with connectors, skills, and plugins.
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