Open Claude, go to Settings, then Account, and choose Export Data. Anthropic emails you a download link containing your conversations as JSON. Convert that file to turn the raw data into readable per-conversation documents.
Short answer
Open Claude, go to Settings, then Account, and choose Export Data. Anthropic emails you a download link containing your conversations as JSON. Convert that file to turn the raw data into readable per-conversation documents.
Step by step
Open Settings: Click your profile in Claude and choose Settings.
Go to Account: Select the Account section, where Anthropic keeps data controls including export and deletion.
Request the export: Click Export Data. Anthropic queues the job and emails you when it is ready, usually within a few minutes to a few hours depending on history size.
Download and convert: Download the archive from the emailed link, then load the JSON into a converter to produce readable documents.
Claude's export is cleaner than ChatGPT's in one important respect and shares its main limitation in another. Knowing both saves time.
What Anthropic gives you
The export arrives as JSON containing your conversations, with messages, timestamps, and conversation titles. Depending on when you export, you may receive a single conversations.json or a folder of per-conversation files.
The structure is flatter than ChatGPT's. Claude does not branch conversations the way ChatGPT does when you edit a message, so the JSON is closer to a straightforward list of messages per conversation. That makes it marginally easier to parse and no easier to read.
The limitation it shares
It is still JSON. Opening it gives you a dense structure with your actual conversation text wrapped in metadata, escaped characters, and nesting. For any purpose other than feeding it to another program, it needs converting.
Anthropic does not provide a converter, and unlike OpenAI there is no chat.html fallback in the archive.
Converting Claude exports
ChatExports reads Claude's export format directly and produces per-conversation documents:
| Format | Use it for |
|---|---|
| Word | Editing, annotating, circulating |
| PDF | Fixed records, printing |
| Markdown | Obsidian, Notion, wikis |
| CSV | Analysis across conversations |
| Plain text | Search indexes and other tools |
Conversations appear as a searchable list so you can export one or all of them, and bulk conversion handles a full history in a single pass.
Processing runs as local JavaScript in your browser. The export never leaves your device.
Artifacts
Claude's artifacts, the documents and code it produces in the side panel, are part of the conversation data and appear in the export as message content. Converting preserves them inline with the conversation, code blocks intact. They do not come out as separate files, so if you want an artifact on its own you will extract it from the converted document.
Projects
Conversations inside Claude Projects are included in the export alongside standalone conversations. Project instructions and uploaded project knowledge are a separate matter and are not reliably included, so copy anything important from a project's configuration manually.
Exporting a single conversation quickly
For one conversation you need immediately, browser printing works: open the chat, scroll to the top so everything loads, then Ctrl+P or Cmd+P and save as PDF. As with ChatGPT, Claude only keeps nearby messages loaded, so failing to scroll to the top truncates the result silently.
For anything longer or more important, the export route is more dependable.
Alongside ChatGPT and Gemini
If you use more than one assistant, the same converter reads all three formats, so a single session covers your whole AI history. See the Claude exporter page for more, and export Gemini chat for Google's equivalent.
Frequently asked questions
How long does a Claude export take?
Usually a few minutes, though large histories can take several hours. Anthropic emails a download link when the archive is ready.
Does the Claude export include artifacts?
Yes, as part of the conversation content. Converting preserves them inline with code blocks intact, though not as separate standalone files.
Can I export a single Claude conversation?
Anthropic's export is account-wide. After exporting you can extract any single conversation with a converter, or print one conversation to PDF from the browser.
Are Claude Projects included?
Conversations within projects are included. Project instructions and uploaded knowledge files are not reliably included, so copy those manually if they matter.