Where Are Cursor Skills Stored? File Paths by OS

Cursor stores your skills and configuration files in specific system directories that vary between macOS, Linux, and Windows. When you create a .cursorrules file or download a SKILL.md from the marketplace, Cursor checks these predefined paths to load your AI agent configurations.

The editor follows a predictable hierarchy: user-level settings first, then project-specific overrides. Understanding where these files live helps you debug missing skills, share configurations across machines, and organize your AI workflows properly.

macOS file locations

On macOS, Cursor stores user-level configurations in your home directory's Library folder:

~/Library/Application Support/Cursor/User/

Skills downloaded from the Browse skills marketplace land in a dedicated subdirectory:

~/Library/Application Support/Cursor/User/skills/

Each skill gets its own folder named after the skill identifier. A typical installation might look like:

~/Library/Application Support/Cursor/User/skills/
├── python-docstring-generator/
│   └── SKILL.md
├── react-component-builder/
│   └── SKILL.md
└── git-commit-helper/
    └── SKILL.md

Global .cursorrules files go directly in the User directory:

~/Library/Application Support/Cursor/User/cursorrules

Project-specific rules live in your repository root as .cursorrules and take precedence over global settings.

Linux directories

Linux follows the XDG Base Directory specification. Cursor configurations default to:

~/.config/cursor/User/

Skills follow the same pattern as macOS:

~/.config/cursor/User/skills/

If you've set the XDG_CONFIG_HOME environment variable, Cursor respects that location instead:

$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/cursor/User/
$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/cursor/User/skills/

This matches how most Linux applications handle configuration storage. Your global cursorrules file sits at:

~/.config/cursor/User/cursorrules

Windows paths

Windows stores Cursor data in your user profile's AppData directory:

%APPDATA%\Cursor\User\

The full path typically resolves to:

C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Roaming\Cursor\User\

Skills install to the same relative location:

%APPDATA%\Cursor\User\skills\

Windows handles the marketplace downloads identically to other platforms. Each skill gets its own subfolder with the SKILL.md file inside.

How Cursor loads configurations

Cursor checks these locations in a specific order when starting up or when you open a new project. The loading sequence affects which settings take precedence.

First, Cursor loads your global user settings from the platform-specific User directory. This includes any installed skills from the marketplace and your global .cursorrules file.

Next, it scans your project directory for local configuration files. A .cursorrules file in your repository root overrides global rules for that project. This project-level approach lets you customize AI behavior per codebase without affecting other work.

The SKILL.md spec defines how individual skill files structure their prompts and metadata. Cursor parses these files on startup and makes their commands available in the editor.

Skills work differently than traditional extensions. Instead of code execution, they inject specialized prompts into your AI conversations. When you trigger a skill, Cursor reads the SKILL.md content and uses it as context for the language model.

Finding your current setup

You can verify your installation paths by checking Cursor's settings. The editor displays active configuration locations in the preferences panel under the Extensions section.

On any platform, you can also manually navigate to these directories to inspect your installed skills. Each SKILL.md file contains human-readable prompt definitions that you can examine or modify.

If skills aren't loading correctly, check file permissions on these directories. Cursor needs read access to parse configuration files and write access to download new skills from the marketplace.

Project-specific configurations

Beyond the global user directories, Cursor always checks your current project root for local settings. A .cursorrules file here takes priority over global configurations.

This project-level approach works well for team collaboration. You can commit .cursorrules files to version control, ensuring everyone on your team gets the same AI behavior for that specific codebase.

The Rules files marketplace provides ready-made configurations for different project types. Download these directly into your repository root to apply specialized prompts for React apps, Python packages, or documentation projects.

Backup and migration

Since skills live in predictable directories, backing up your configuration is straightforward. Copy the entire User/skills/ folder to preserve all marketplace downloads.

For global rules, grab the cursorrules file from your User directory. Project-specific rules travel with your repositories automatically if you commit .cursorrules files to version control.

When setting up Cursor on a new machine, drop your backed-up files into the appropriate platform directory. Cursor will pick them up on the next restart without additional configuration.

The Install skills process works the same way across all platforms. The marketplace handles the platform-specific path resolution automatically when you download new skills.

Understanding these file locations helps you troubleshoot issues and organize your AI development workflow. Unlike MCP servers that require more complex setup, Cursor skills use simple file-based configuration that's easy to manage and share across your development environments.