Incognito mode

What it is

An incognito chat isn’t saved to your history and isn’t used for training. Think of it as the private-browsing equivalent for Claude.

Click the ghost icon in the top-right corner of the chat window to start an incognito chat.

Click the ghost icon in the top-right corner of any new chat screen (claude.ai/new). Only available outside projects.

Open a new chat outside a project (claude.ai/new).
Click the ghost icon in the top-right corner of the screen.
The interface enters incognito mode: a black border appears around the window, “Incognito chat” is shown in the top-left corner, and the heading reads “Let’s chat incognito”.
Chat as normal — the conversation is not saved to your history and won’t be used for model training.
When you’re done, click the × in the top-right corner to close the incognito chat.

Incognito chats close when you leave them. Once closed, they cannot be reopened — there’s no history to return to.
Not available inside projects. The ghost icon only appears on new chats that aren’t inside a project.
Not zero retention. Chats are retained server-side for 30 days by default (longer for Enterprise, per org policy), but they don’t appear in your chat history and are excluded from memory and search.
Enterprise note. On Team and Enterprise plans, incognito chats are included in organisational data exports and compliance APIs, even though they’re absent from personal chat history.

2026-05-03 — Web coverage verified. Ghost icon in the top-right corner of new chats (not available inside projects); UI shows black border and “Incognito chat” label. Promoted platforms.web.status from stub to covered.
2026-04-18 — Incognito mode now available on Claude for Desktop via a ghost icon in the top-right of the chat window.
2026-04-18 — Page created as a stub.