AI glossary

What is Prompt engineering?

Prompt engineering is the practice of writing inputs (prompts) that get an AI model to produce the output you want. It covers giving the model a role, clear instructions, context, examples, and a target format. Better prompts, not a better model, are usually what separate weak results from great ones.

Because a model like Claude only acts on what you give it, small changes to how you ask, adding a role, constraints, or an example, can dramatically change the quality of the answer. Prompt engineering is learnable and mostly about clarity, not tricks.

Example

Instead of "write about our product", a good prompt is: "You are a B2B copywriter. Write a 5-line LinkedIn post announcing X to Y audience, in a plain, confident tone."

Put the theory to work.

Kognitaa teaches these ideas by doing, on real tasks in Claude. The free Foundations level costs nothing.

Related terms

System promptContext window