Claude Code session

Definition

A Claude Code session is one saved conversation with Claude Code, tied to a project folder and stored on your machine so you can pick it up again later.

Also called: Claude Code conversation, Claude Code chat, Claude Code transcript.

Claude Code writes each session continuously to a transcript file while you work. By default it lives at ~/.claude/projects/<project>/<session-id>.jsonl, where <project> is the working directory's path with every non-alphanumeric character replaced by - (so /Users/me/acme-api becomes -Users-me-acme-api). Each line is one JSON entry: a message, a tool call or metadata. Anthropic treats that format as internal, so it can change between versions.

Getting back into a session

• claude --continue reopens the most recent session in the current folder.
• claude --resume opens a picker; claude --resume <name or id> goes straight to one.
• /resume switches sessions from inside Claude Code.
• /branch, or --fork-session with --resume/--continue, copies a session into a new one with its own ID (see fork).

The terminal, the Claude desktop app's Code tab, the VS Code extension and claude.ai/code each keep their own session history. Sessions that run on Anthropic's servers are cloud sessions. Local transcripts are cleaned up after 30 days by default (the cleanupPeriodDays setting).

In Pairbar

Pairbar reads the Claude desktop app's session list and the transcripts in ~/.claude/projects, read-only, and shows each session as a row in the Chats tab next to your Codex threads. Rows show whether a session is working, needs you or is unread, and clicking one opens it in Claude through its claude:// link. Search covers what was said in the conversation. See Chats and Search.