--- title: "Get started with Bearly" description: "Sign in, start a conversation, and learn the essential controls for working with Bearly." canonical: "https://bearly.ai/docs/" markdown: "https://bearly.ai/docs.md" --- # Get started with Bearly HTML: [https://bearly.ai/docs/](https://bearly.ai/docs/) > Sign in, start a conversation, and learn the essential controls for working with Bearly. Bearly gives you one place to ask questions, work with files, research ideas, and return to earlier conversations. ## Choose where to work - **Web:** open [Bearly in your browser](https://bearly.ai/dashboard/focus). The web app works without an installation. - **Desktop:** visit [bearly.ai](https://bearly.ai) and choose the download for Mac, Windows, or Linux. If you are already signed in on the web, open **App Settings** → **Get Desktop App**. - **iPhone or iPad:** install [Bearly from the App Store](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/bearly-ai/id6445975220). Other mobile devices can use the web app. Bearly uses the same account across its apps. A chat protected to one device must still be opened on that device, and features that work with local files or other apps may require Bearly for desktop. ## Sign in 1. Open Bearly and select **Continue with Google** or **Continue with Microsoft** when it is offered, or enter your address under **Email** and select **Continue**. Microsoft sign-in works for organizations that have [connected Microsoft Entra to their Bearly team](https://bearly.ai/docs/teams/microsoft-entra.md). 2. If you continue by email, open the message from Bearly. Paste the three-word code—or type one word into each field—under **Check your email**. 3. Select **Sign in**. If Bearly says the codewords are invalid, select **Back**, confirm the email address, and request a new code. Some managed accounts require a work email. ## Start your first chat 1. Select **New Chat**. 2. Write what you want in the message box. A useful first request includes the outcome, any context Bearly should know, and the form you want back. For example: `Turn these meeting notes into a concise decision memo with owners and open questions.` 3. To include a file, select the **+** button and choose **Attach files**. Wait for the file to finish uploading or analyzing. 4. Select **Send message**, or press Enter on a computer. Bearly begins answering in the same chat. You can keep asking follow-up questions without repeating the whole request. Select **Stop** if you need to end an answer while it is being written. > **Tip — Your work is organized as you go** > Bearly gives an active conversation a title and places it in the sidebar. You can rename, pin, archive, move, or delete it later. ## Where to go next - [Have your first conversation](https://bearly.ai/docs/chats/first-chat.md) for editing, rerunning, copying, and deleting messages. - [Work with files in a chat](https://bearly.ai/docs/chats/files.md) for previews, downloads, and the file browser. - [Organize your chats](https://bearly.ai/docs/chats/organize.md) for search, projects, archives, and bulk actions. - [Create a project](https://bearly.ai/docs/projects/overview.md) when several chats and documents belong to the same body of work. If Bearly cannot prepare a new chat, it keeps your draft in the composer and usually retries automatically. Use **Try again** if the notice remains after your connection returns. For other problems, contact [Bearly Support](mailto:support@bearly.ai). ## Documentation directory ### Getting Started - [Get started with Bearly](https://bearly.ai/docs.md): Sign in, start a conversation, and learn the essential controls for working with Bearly. - [Have your first conversation](https://bearly.ai/docs/chats/first-chat.md): Start a Bearly chat, guide the answer, revise your request, and use the controls on each message. - [Work with files in a chat](https://bearly.ai/docs/chats/files.md): Attach files, follow upload progress, preview results, and download files from a Bearly conversation. - [Organize your chats](https://bearly.ai/docs/chats/organize.md): Search, rename, pin, archive, move, select, and delete Bearly conversations. - [Ask Bearly to manage your chats](https://bearly.ai/docs/chats/manage-with-bearly.md): Find, read, create, rename, move, and delete conversations by asking Bearly in chat. ### Research & Context - [Search the web, find images, and run Deep Research](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/web-search-deep-research.md): Find current information and visual references in chat, or plan a longer investigation that produces a sourced report. - [Look up a person with People Search](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/people-search.md): Confirm which person you mean, then get a cited brief of their public work with a source and date on every claim. - [Research your documents](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/document-research.md): Ask focused questions across attached or project files, compare sources, and open cited passages for verification. - [Summarize a document](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/deep-summary.md): Create a structured Deep Summary of a long document, then continue working with it in the same chat. - [Find conversations and control memories](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/memory-search.md): Search your Bearly chat history and choose which earlier conversations a chat can use for context. - [Work with local files](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/work-locally.md): Let Bearly read, create, edit, and run files on your computer from a folder you choose. - [Use your computer with Bearly](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/computer-use.md): Let Bearly complete tasks in visible desktop apps while you control what it can see, do, and how long access lasts. - [Browse beside a Bearly chat](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/browser.md): Open sites in Bearly Browser, annotate a page, or approve limited site access for a chat task. - [Use Bearly on a web page](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/browser-extension.md): Summarize, question, or explain the page you are reading with the Bearly extension for Chrome, without leaving the tab. - [Control Chrome from Bearly](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/chrome-control.md): Let a Bearly desktop chat read, navigate, and inspect your regular Chrome tabs, including sites you are already signed in to. - [Find and check domain names](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/domain-research.md): Ask Bearly for domain ideas around a product, company, or theme, then check whether a specific domain is still available to register. ### Create & Transform - [Create interactive AI artifacts with Pages](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/artifacts.md): Build, refine, reopen, and download interactive AI artifacts such as calculators, dashboards, planners, and small tools in Bearly. - [Edit a long draft in Canvas](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/canvas.md): Turn a Bearly response into a Markdown draft, edit it directly, preview the formatting, and ask AI for focused revisions. - [Analyze data with Code Interpreter](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/code-interpreter.md): Let Bearly run Python for calculations, data analysis, charts, file conversion, and generated files. - [Create charts from spreadsheets](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/charts.md): Turn a spreadsheet or CSV into a KPI card, bar chart, or line chart with the source data ready to inspect and download. - [Create and edit documents](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/document-editor.md): Use Document Editor to create, revise, and convert PDF, Word, PowerPoint, and Excel files in a Bearly chat. - [Check grammar and clarity](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/grammar-correction.md): Review grammar, spelling, punctuation, style, vocabulary, and clarity suggestions without losing your original meaning. - [Generate images](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/image-generation.md): Create an image from a written description, compare models, refine the prompt, and save the result. - [Edit an image](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/image-editing.md): Change an uploaded or generated image with a written instruction, compare edits, and continue from the best result. - [Combine images](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/image-combining.md): Select several source images, explain how their elements should relate, and create a new composite in the image gallery. - [Create and edit videos](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/video-generation.md): Generate a short video from text or an image, request sound and format choices, and transform an existing clip. - [Download a video](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/download-video.md): Save videos from supported public sites to a Bearly chat, follow download progress, and keep the resulting files. - [Turn text into speech](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/text-to-speech.md): Listen to a Bearly answer or create downloadable spoken audio with the voice and delivery you want. - [Transcribe audio and video](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/transcripts.md): Turn recordings into searchable text, follow along with playback, label speakers, and download subtitles. ### Workflows - [Run prompts on a schedule with Routines](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/routines.md): Create a routine that runs a saved prompt on a schedule, keeps every run in its own chat, and can email or text you the result. - [Record and transcribe meetings](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/meetings.md): Record online meetings, in-person conversations, and voice notes in Bearly, with a live transcript, speaker names, summaries, and a chat that starts from the transcript. - [Dictate instead of typing](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/dictation.md): Turn on dictation, speak into the message box with a click or a held key, and choose what happens to the finished transcript. - [Talk with Bearly by voice](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/voice-conversations.md): Start a live voice conversation, manage the microphone and call, and continue from the saved transcript. - [Add workflows with Skills](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/skills.md): Install, manage, and use reusable Bearly workflows from the Skill Store or a trusted source. - [Create reusable Prompt Templates](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/prompt-templates.md): Turn a recurring instruction into a reusable form that you can fill out and submit in any Bearly chat. - [Compare answers with Council of Experts](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/council-of-experts.md): Ask several AI models the same question, inspect their individual answers, and use Bearly's synthesis. - [Send email or text messages from a chat](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/send-email.md): Send formatted email or a concise text message from a Bearly chat, then confirm the result and recover from failures. - [Connect services and MCP servers](https://bearly.ai/docs/features/connectors.md): Add a supported service or your own MCP server, then choose which chats and Routines can use its tools. ### Projects - [Organize chats with projects](https://bearly.ai/docs/projects/overview.md): Keep related chats, files, instructions, and settings together in a Bearly project. - [Add files to a project](https://bearly.ai/docs/projects/documents.md): Upload, search, inspect, and manage files that Bearly can use across a project's chats. - [Set project-wide chat defaults](https://bearly.ai/docs/projects/settings.md): Choose the model, language, style, instructions, and document behavior for chats in a project. - [Share a project with your team](https://bearly.ai/docs/projects/collaboration.md): Give a team or individual teammates Reader, Writer, or Owner access to a Bearly project. - [Protect a project with a password](https://bearly.ai/docs/projects/encryption.md): Add, use, change, or remove password protection for a Bearly project. ### Teams - [Create and manage a team](https://bearly.ai/docs/teams/overview.md): Create a Bearly team, review its account details, rename it, leave it, or delete it when eligible. - [Manage team members](https://bearly.ai/docs/teams/members.md): Add people to a Bearly team, import a roster from CSV, change member access, and remove members. - [Connect Microsoft Entra to a team](https://bearly.ai/docs/teams/microsoft-entra.md): Let a managed Bearly team sign in with Microsoft work or school accounts, and provision members and groups from Microsoft Entra. - [Manage team billing and seats](https://bearly.ai/docs/teams/billing.md): Start a team billing account, buy and assign seats, change seat plans, and resolve payment issues. - [Set team policies](https://bearly.ai/docs/teams/policies.md): Set shared chat defaults, model access, feature permissions, and spending limits for members of a managed team. - [Review team usage](https://bearly.ai/docs/teams/usage.md): Compare a managed team's AI spend and calls across members, models, and recent months. - [Distribute skills from a shared folder](https://bearly.ai/docs/teams/skill-stores.md): Register a managed team's shared skill library and assign individual skills through team policies. - [Review team activity](https://bearly.ai/docs/teams/activity.md): See who changed your team's settings, policies, and membership, with readable before-and-after details. ### Settings & Account - [Change your chat settings](https://bearly.ai/docs/settings/chat-settings.md): Choose how Bearly responds in one conversation, set defaults for new chats, and control the personal context shared with AI models. - [Manage billing and review usage](https://bearly.ai/docs/account/billing-usage.md): Change your Bearly plan, review the current credit period, add a credit boost, and see monthly usage by model. ### Privacy & Security - [Privacy and security in Bearly](https://bearly.ai/docs/privacy-security.md): Understand how private AI works in Bearly, what a model receives, and which privacy, memory, encryption, and access controls you can use. - [Use zero-data-retention models](https://bearly.ai/docs/zero-data-retention.md): See which models run with zero data retention, restrict Bearly to those models, and understand what the setting covers. ### Changelog - [Changelog](https://bearly.ai/docs/changelog.md): Every Bearly release since June 2024, newest first, with what changed in each one. ### Legal - [Privacy Policy](https://bearly.ai/privacy-policy.md): Bearly AI Privacy Policy - [Terms of Service](https://bearly.ai/terms-of-service.md): Bearly AI Terms of Service