Claude profiles

A Claude profile is one Claude Code config folder with its own login, settings, plugins and sessions. Add a profile for each account you use, and Switchboard lists all their sessions together, shows which account each one runs on, and keeps their usage apart.

Open it

• Press Command, Comma⌘,Control, CommaCtrl, and choose Claude profiles.
• Or run Settings in the command palette (Command, K or Command, Shift, P⌘Kor⌘⇧PControl, K or Control, Shift, PCtrlKorCtrlShiftP), then Settings: Claude profiles.

How profiles work

Your first profile is Claude Code’s own folder, usually ~/.claude%USERPROFILE%\.claude. Every other profile is a folder of its own, such as ~/.claude-work%USERPROFILE%\.claude-work, the same folder you would point CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR at in a terminal.

Switchboard never handles your login. You sign in with Claude Code itself, once per folder, and Switchboard runs Claude Code with that folder for the sessions of that profile.

Add a profile

1. Click Add profile.
2. Give it a name and pick a colour.
3. Check the Config folder. Switchboard suggests one in your home folder from the name (.claude-work for “Work”); type another path or click Choose…. A folder that doesn’t exist yet is created. To see the sessions of a folder you already use with CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR, pick that folder.
4. Click Add profile.

Sign in

A profile that isn’t signed in yet says Not signed in yet and shows the command to run, with a copy button:

1. Open TerminalPowerShell and run the command. On a Mac that is, for example, CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR=~/.claude-work claude. On Windows, see Sign in on Windows.
2. Type /login and sign in with the other account.

Once you’re signed in, the profile shows Signed in as with the account’s email (and its organisation, if it has one).

Sign in on Windows

Settings shows the sign-in command in the form a Mac terminal understands (CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR=… claude), on Windows too. PowerShell doesn’t run that form. Set the variable first, then start Claude Code, using the folder Settings shows:

$env:CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR = "$HOME\.claude-work"
claude

The variable stays set in that PowerShell window only. Close it when you’re done, so a later claude there doesn’t use the other account by mistake.

How to set up another profile

Under the list, How to set up another profile walks through it step by step: create the folder and sign in, add it in Switchboard, link your projects, and optionally add a terminal alias such as alias claude-work='CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR=~/.claude-work claude' to ~/.zshrc.

The guide’s steps are written for a Mac terminal. In PowerShell, use the commands from Sign in on Windows. For a shortcut, add a function such as function claude-work { $env:CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR = "$HOME\.claude-work"; claude @args; Remove-Item Env:CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR } to your PowerShell profile (notepad $PROFILE).

Choose the default profile

Choose Default on a profile. Projects that don’t have a profile of their own use the default.

Link a project to a profile

With more than one profile, you can link a project to the account its sessions should use:

• On the project’s page, open the Settings tab and pick a Claude profile. See Project settings.
• Or open the project’s menu in the sidebar’s project list: Claude profile lists Default and each profile.

New sessions in that project use the linked profile. Other projects use the default.

Pick a profile for one session

In New session, the profile chip under the message box shows the profile the folder uses. Click it to pick another account for this one session. A running session keeps its profile; to use another account, start a new session.

See which account a session uses

With more than one profile:

• The rail on each session row in the sidebar shows the profile’s colour, on every row. Hover a row to see the profile’s name.
• The usage band under the message box shows the limits of the session’s account.
• Home has a Profiles section with a card per profile: its name, the account’s email, what its sessions are doing (“1 needs you · 2 working · 5 today”) and its plan usage, with when each limit resets.

Rename, recolour or remove a profile

• Type a new name in the profile’s name field, and pick another colour from its swatches.
• × removes a profile from Switchboard after you confirm. Its sessions leave the sidebar and its projects use the default profile again. The folder, its login and its sessions stay on disk; add the folder again to get them back. Claude Code’s own folder can’t be removed.

A profile whose folder is gone says folder not found.

Settings

Profiles are managed in Settings → Claude profiles. The link between a project and a profile is part of the project, in its Settings tab.