Overview

Claude's regular web search is already powerful. It can search across 10, 20, even 30 websites in a single message and often gives great results quickly. For the majority of tasks, that's all you need.

Research mode takes it further. Instead of running a series of independent searches, Claude conducts multiple searches that build on each other, adapting its approach as it finds new information, following promising leads, filling in gaps, and exploring angles it hadn't originally considered. The result is a structured report with citations you can easily verify. This can take anywhere from 5 to 45 minutes depending on the complexity.

Two Ways to Use Research Mode

Approach 1: Start with a Conversation (Recommended)

Start with a normal chat. Build up context, go back and forth until Claude really understands what you're working on, then toggle Research on when you're ready for a deep dive.

You can turn Research on at any point in any conversation, so even if you didn't plan on doing research, you can always decide to go deeper mid-chat. This approach tends to produce better results because Claude already has context from your conversation before it starts researching.

Approach 2: Go Straight In

Start a new chat with Research enabled and give Claude a detailed prompt describing what you need. If your prompt isn't specific enough, Claude will ask follow-up questions before it starts. The more detail you give upfront, the better the results. When crafting your research prompt, think about the same things you'd think about when making any great prompt.

To enable Research, click the Research button in the bottom left of your chat.

Research with Connected Integrations

Research gets more powerful when you have connectors set up. If you've got Google Workspace or other tools connected, Research doesn't just search the web. It can pull from your emails, calendar, and documents at the same time.

So you can ask something like "summarise what's been discussed about Project X across my emails, then research best practices for similar initiatives" and Claude handles both the internal and external research in one go.

Enterprise Search

On Team and Enterprise plans, there's a feature called Enterprise Search that's specifically designed for finding information across your company's internal tools: Slack conversations, emails, SharePoint documents, Google Drive files, meeting notes. All from within Claude.

Think of it as a pre-built project for your whole organisation. Your admin connects the company's tools, you authenticate with your own accounts, and then you've got a dedicated "Ask [Your Org Name]" project sitting in your sidebar ready to go.

This is great for the kind of questions you'd normally have to message someone for or spend time hunting through Slack for. Things like "what's our remote work policy?", "what were the key decisions from last week's leadership meeting?", or "how does our onboarding process work?"

If your organisation has this set up, it's worth trying. If you don't see it in your sidebar, check with your admin.

Key Takeaways

• Regular web search handles most tasks. Research mode is for when you need depth, not just quick answers.

• Starting with a conversation before toggling Research on tends to produce better results because Claude already has context from your back-and-forth.

• Research works with connected integrations. It can pull from your emails, calendar, and documents alongside web sources in a single task.

• Enterprise Search is for internal information. If your organisation has it set up, it searches across Slack, email, Drive, and other company tools from within Claude.