Why does a long Claude Code session still burn your context?
Leave a huge Claude Code conversation idle and your next message pays full context cost again once the prompt cache expires. Idle compaction fixes this by summarizing the idle conversation and using the summary on your next message.
What it is
Claude Code now compacts idle sessions in VS Code and Claude Desktop's Code tab. A 200K+ token conversation left idle is summarized, and the summary is used on your next message if the prompt cache has expired.
Applied case
A developer leaves a 200K+ token session open overnight in VS Code. By morning the prompt cache has expired, so instead of replaying the whole conversation, Claude Code summarizes it and resumes from the summary. The same release also fixes sessions failing turn after turn with an effort cap, silent exit code 0 on startup failure, and Bedrock image-heavy sessions failing compaction, so long-running work stays usable.
- Idle 200K+ token sessions get summarized and resume from the summary after cache expiry
When to use it
Use when you keep long sessions open in VS Code or Claude Desktop's Code tab across breaks.
Skip when you work in short sessions or the prompt cache is still warm.
Read more
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