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Personas

A persona is a reusable instruction set that shapes how the AI replies — a tone, a role, or a format. It's not a separate bot.

3 min read Updated 22 July 2026

1Use a persona

Cognos ships a set of built-in personas. Switch persona from the chip in the message box, or open the Personas page to browse them all.

2Create your own

  1. Open Personas and select New persona

    From the Personas page.

  2. Describe it

    Give it a name, a description, and the instructions the AI should follow. Add a colour and icon if you like.

  3. Optionally make it your default

    Turn on Use as default so it applies to new chats.

The Personas page showing pinned, recent and official personas in a grid.
Your personas, including the built-in "Official" ones.

3Good to know

  • Your custom personas are private and encrypted.
  • Your default persona follows you across devices.
  • If a persona is deleted or can't be loaded, chat still works — it just falls back to no persona.
  • Personas are personal to your account; there's no shared persona.

Keep reading

Your first chatType a message, pick a model if you like, and send. Your conversation is saved and encrypted automatically.MemoryMemory lets the AI remember facts and preferences you choose — across your chats, or within a project.Choosing a modelCognos offers many models. Pick one by name, or filter by what you need — speed, reasoning, web search, or images.