The catch with Cowork on your phone

Claude Cowork just landed on your phone, and there is a catch nobody is talking about.

The update itself is genuinely useful. Cowork now runs from the Claude app on your phone and from the browser, sessions run in the cloud, and scheduled tasks fire with the laptop shut. Start a job at your desk and it carries on while you are out the door.

The catch is that your phone cannot reach the files on your computer. For most small business owners, that is where the whole Claude setup lives. The instructions, the tone of voice, the business context, all sitting in folders only one machine can see. Open Claude on your phone and none of it loads, so you are back to answers that could have been written for anyone.

The fix is to stop treating your laptop as the home of your setup. Three moves do it.

First, build your skills properly. Skills attach to your Claude account, not your machine, so they follow you onto every device you sign into.

Second, move your working files into Google Drive or Dropbox.

Third, connect that storage to Claude with a connector. A connector is a bridge that lets Claude read a folder that is not sitting on your laptop.

Do all three and the phone stops being the stripped-back extra. Claude in your pocket briefs those cloud sessions with your real context, and it knows your business as well as Claude at your desk does.

Move the files this week. It is an afternoon of dragging folders, and it unlocks every device you own.