Memory Banks and Persistent Context for Long-Term Projects

In our previous lessons, we learned how to provide the AI with context on a per-task basis using @-references and project-wide instructions using .cursor/rules. While powerful, these methods are either temporary (tied to a single chat) or focused on providing rules and instructions. As projects grow over weeks and months, a new challenge emerges: how do we ensure that the AI maintains a consistent, high-level understanding of our project’s core architecture and key decisions without us having to re-explain them constantly?

This is the problem that Cursor’s Memory Banks are designed to solve. Memory Banks act as a persistent, long-term memory for the AI, allowing us to store crucial project knowledge that it can reference in any chat, at any time. In this lesson, we will learn how to create and utilize a Memory Bank for our Markdown Notes App to ensure consistent AI behavior.

What are Memory Banks?

A Memory Bank is a special file, typically named ...