---
title: "Auto-loaded files · Finch Agent"
description: "The rules and memory attached to every conversation"
source: https://finchwork.app/en/docs/context-and-files
---

# Auto-loaded files

Finch's personal home directory holds a handful of Markdown files that are automatically loaded at the start of every conversation, so you never have to re-explain them. Knowing what's in each one helps you know which to edit.

## Loaded into every conversation

| File | Contents | Maintained by |
| --- | --- | --- |
| `SOUL.md` | Finch's "personality" — tone and working style, relatively stable | You, by hand |
| `FINCH.md` | Rules for how Finch works — e.g. how to use memory, how to handle risky actions | You, by hand |
| `USER.md` | Stable facts about you — how to address you, communication preferences | Mostly you, with facts Finch observes added in |
| `MEMORY.md` | Current projects, plus cross-project habits and conventions | Finch maintains it automatically; you can also ask it to edit |

These four files are small on disk, so they're loaded in full every time, without you having to mention them.

## Loaded depending on context

-   **Opening a directory-bound Space**: the `AGENTS.md` in that folder (if present) is loaded, containing rules specific to that project.
-   **Opening a Space without a bound directory**: that Space's own rules/notes file is loaded, serving the same role as `AGENTS.md`, just stored differently.
-   **A Space that has already accumulated its own memory**: the corresponding Space memory file is loaded too, affecting only conversations in that Space, never mixed with others.

## Editing these files

Just tell Finch "remember..." or "update the ... in USER.md," and it will edit the file using its tools — no need to find and edit it manually, though you're free to open and edit it yourself too. `SOUL.md` and `FINCH.md` are meant to be maintained mostly by hand — Finch generally won't rewrite them significantly on its own, only when you explicitly ask it to.