You'll noticeTier: how much it should matter to you
2Useful: my rating, 1 to 5
2Signal: worth watching, 1 to 5
ElsewhereArea: what it touches
ImprovementsKind: in v2.1.290,
ImprovementsSection of the release
What
Running /plugin in the desktop app now gives you a short explanation instead of trying to open its menu. /plugin opens a panel meant for the terminal, so it cannot run in the desktop app. The message points you to:
The + > Plugins menu in the app.
claude plugin marketplace add on the command line, followed by /reload-plugins.
This applies to the desktop app only, not WSL (Linux running inside Windows) and not remote sessions.
Why
Desktop users get clear directions instead of a command that fails without saying why.
The entry above is what we published on the day. These lines were added later, as Anthropic's own pages caught up, and they sit beside the original rather than replacing it.
Confirmed sinceAnthropic's documentation has since written up /plugin, on Mods reference.Look up any event a [mod](/docs/en/plugins/mods/overview) can handle, mods API method it can call, or render site it can draw in, for the Claude Code CLI and the Desktop app as of v2.1.290. Each entry gives the name and a one-line descript…plugins/mods/referencesee the edit
Added sinceA small documentation edit on Plugin commands reference touched a line naming /plugin after this was published.> Reference for the claude plugin shell commands, /plugin and /reload-plugins in a session, and the flags that load a plugin for one session.plugins/cli-referencesee the edit
How sure we are
Two sources agreeTwo things we can check say the same as this entry.
Anthropic's documentation agreesA small documentation edit on Plugin commands reference touched a line naming /plugin after this was published.
Anthropic's release notes agreeImproved the reply to /plugin in the desktop app's Code tab: it now says where to install and manage plugins there
