Support

Shelf for Claude · Help, how-to and frequently asked questions

Getting started

Install Shelf for Claude from the Chrome Web Store, then open any conversation on claude.ai. A small S button appears near the bottom-right corner of the page; click it or press Alt+K (⌥+K on a Mac) to open the Shelf panel. Press the same shortcut or Esc to close it.

Shelf works passively: it remembers the title and visible message text of chats you open, in your own browser. It does not crawl your account, send messages, or open chats for you. Long chats load in parts on claude.ai—press Load whole chat in the panel and Shelf presses claude.ai's own “load more” buttons and scrolls through the chat so every message is captured.

The Options page (link at the bottom of the panel, or right-click the extension icon → Options) holds your license, behaviour settings, prompt library and data tools.

Search

Type in the Search tab to search every chat you have opened. Results show a highlighted snippet; click one (or use ↑ ↓ and Enter) to jump to that message in the chat. Narrow results by role (you / Claude), folder, date captured (today, 7 days, 30 days) or tick This chat only. Korean and Japanese partial matches work too.

Only chats you have opened since installing Shelf are searchable—open an older chat once and it joins the index.

Export to Markdown

Press Export in the panel header. Download .md saves a Markdown file to your Downloads folder; Copy to clipboard puts the same Markdown on your clipboard. Options let you include Claude's extended thinking, mention artifacts, export only bookmarked messages, or Select messages—then click the messages you want and export just those. Markdown export is unlimited on the free plan.

Folders and bookmarks

Folders: in the Folders tab, type a name and press Add. File the open chat with Move to… or drag a chat onto a folder. Folders can be renamed, coloured, collapsed and deleted (deleting a folder moves its chats back to Unfiled). Subfolders—one level deep—are a Pro feature.

Bookmarks: hover a message in the chat and press Alt+B (⌥+B). The Bookmarks tab lists them with a snippet; click one to jump back, or × to remove it. If Shelf says the message is not captured yet, wait a moment and press again.

Prompt library

Save reusable prompts on the Options page. Write {{variable}} anywhere in the body (for example Explain {{topic}} to a {{audience}}). In the panel's Prompts tab, click a prompt to fill in its variables, then Insert to place the text in the claude.ai composer—nothing is sent until you press send yourself. Prompts can be exported and imported as JSON from the Options page.

Free vs Pro

Pro is $4.99 / month, $39 / year or $49 once (lifetime). Purchases are processed by Polar, our merchant of record; prices exclude any VAT/sales tax Polar applies for your country. One license can be active on up to 3 browsers at the same time.

Your license

Activating Pro

After checkout, Polar emails you a license key. Open the extension's Options page, paste the key into License key and press Activate. The panel footer switches from Free to Pro within a moment. Activation sends only the key to Shelf's license server, which confirms it with Polar—no conversation data is involved.

Renewals and offline use

The extension re-checks the license once a day. If your computer is offline, Pro keeps working for 7 days before falling back to Free until the next successful check.

Moving to another browser

Activate the same key on the new browser. If you hit the 3-browser limit, open the customer portal, sign in with your checkout email (Polar sends a one-time code), and remove an old activation under your license key.

Cancelling, invoices, refunds

Manage or cancel a subscription any time in the customer portal. Pro stays on until the end of the period you paid for, then the extension returns to Free automatically. Invoices and receipts are available in the same portal. For billing questions or refund requests, email us with your checkout email.

Your data

Everything Shelf stores stays in your browser: conversation text and folders in IndexedDB, settings and prompts in the extension's local storage. Nothing is uploaded and there is no analytics or tracking—see the privacy policy.

On the Options page, Download everything as JSON makes a full backup and Delete all Shelf for Claude data erases the local index. Both need a claude.ai tab open (the data lives with that site in your browser). If you plan to uninstall, run Delete all first; otherwise Chrome may keep the claude.ai-side database until you clear site data for claude.ai.

Troubleshooting

• The S button or panel does not appear. Reload the claude.ai tab. Check that the extension is enabled at chrome://extensions and that you are on https://claude.ai (the desktop app and other domains are not supported).
• “Shelf can't read this page's layout.” claude.ai changed its page structure. Capture, search and export pause on that page until we ship an update—usually within days. Your data is safe. Email us if the banner stays for more than a week.
• Search does not find an older message. Open that chat and press Load whole chat, then search again.
• Options page says “Open claude.ai in a tab first”. Stats, backup and Delete all read the database that lives with claude.ai—open claude.ai in any tab and try again.
• The license key is rejected. Copy it exactly as it appears in the Polar email. “Activation limit reached” means 3 browsers already use the key—remove one in the customer portal. “Revoked” means the subscription ended or was refunded.