sessions

Close your sessions without losing your place: save open Claude Code sessions, then reopen them all in one go.

Before closing them (a reboot, a terminal update, or just stopping for the day), ask Claude to save your sessions: it lists the Claude Code sessions running on the machine and lets you pick which to keep. Later, start Claude Code anywhere and ask it to restore your sessions: each one reopens resumed in its original folder, in the same kind of terminal it ran in — Git Bash, PowerShell or cmd on Windows; bash, zsh or fish in your terminal or tmux on Linux; zsh or bash in Terminal, iTerm2, Ghostty and others on macOS.

No more writing session ids down. Or let the session manager do it: say "manage sessions" once, and every session you start or resume is added to the list automatically, so even a crash or a sudden reboot loses nothing.

Install

claude plugin marketplace add vslipchenko/ai
claude plugin install sessions@vslipchenko

Then restart Claude Code.

Requirements:

Claude Code in a terminal (the claude CLI). It saves and reopens terminal sessions only: sessions in Claude Desktop, the IDE extensions, claude.ai chat or Cowork are never listed, and the plugin can't do anything when installed there.
Windows 10/11 with Windows PowerShell 5.1 (built in). Git Bash and Windows Terminal are used when installed, never required.
Linux with Python 3 (preinstalled on almost every desktop distro). Works under WSL too.
macOS with Python 3 from Apple's Command Line Tools (/usr/bin/python3; installed with xcode-select --install, and already there if you use git). macOS support is tested on GitHub's macOS runners but not yet on a real Mac — see Limits.

Skills

Invoke	What it does
`save`	List live Claude Code sessions, let you pick, and store them, replacing the previously saved set.
`restore`	Reopen every saved session, each with `claude --resume <id>` in its folder and original terminal.
`clear` (also `/sessions:remove`)	Delete the saved set without restoring it (only the list; the conversations stay). Asks first if some were never restored.
`manage`	Session manager: keep the saved set up to date automatically (see below). Also turns it off and shows its status.

They respond to natural language, e.g. "save my sessions, I'm rebooting", "restore my sessions", "restore just the API one", "restore them in cmd this time", "restore them in tmux", "always restore in Git Bash", "clear sessions" or "remove sessions", "manage sessions", "stop managing sessions".

Session manager

Instead of saving by hand, say "manage sessions" (or "session manager"). It asks what to start with — all open sessions, some you pick, or none for a fresh start where only sessions started or resumed from then on are added — then keeps the list current on its own:

What happens to a session	On the list?
started or resumed (in any folder, any terminal)	added, with its folder, shell and terminal
closed with `/exit`, Ctrl+D or `/logout`	dropped — you closed it on purpose
`/clear` or `/resume` to another session	swapped for the new one
window closed, process killed, crash, power loss, reboot	kept

Restore them any time with "restore my sessions". Managing stays on across reboots until you say "stop managing sessions"; the list is kept when you stop. While it's on, a manual save asks to turn it off first, and clear empties the list without stopping it.

It works through two plugin hooks (SessionStart, SessionEnd) that run in the background and exit at once while managing is off. Headless runs (claude -p, the SDK) are never added. Each Claude Code install (e.g. Windows and WSL) has its own list. Sessions that were already open when the plugin was installed or updated pick the hooks up after /reload-plugins or a restart.

Where sessions reopen

save records the shell each session was started from, and — when it can be told — the window or terminal it was in.

Windows

Saved from	Reopens in
Git Bash (its own window)	a Git Bash window
Git Bash inside Windows Terminal	a Windows Terminal tab running Git Bash
PowerShell 7 / Windows PowerShell / cmd in a standalone console window	a standalone console window with the same shell
PowerShell 7 / Windows PowerShell / cmd in Windows Terminal	a Windows Terminal tab (all in one window), or a console window without Windows Terminal
VS Code / JetBrains terminal	a Windows Terminal tab with the same shell (editor terminals can't be opened from outside)
unknown (e.g. sessions saved by version 1.0.0)	Windows PowerShell

Fallbacks. If the saved shell isn't there any more (say Git Bash was uninstalled), the session still opens, in PowerShell 7, else Windows PowerShell, else cmd, and you're told which session fell back and why. A missing Windows Terminal or Git Bash window (mintty) likewise falls back to the other.

Linux

Saved from	Reopens in
bash / zsh / fish / sh in GNOME Terminal, Ptyxis, Console, Konsole, xfce4-terminal, Tilix, Terminator, kitty, WezTerm, Alacritty, foot or xterm	the same shell in the same terminal
tmux	a new window in the same tmux session (recreated detached if tmux was restarted; `tmux attach -t <name>`)
WSL inside Windows Terminal	a Windows Terminal tab running WSL
VS Code terminal, SSH, unknown	the system default / first installed terminal

Fallbacks. On Linux a missing shell falls back to bash, then sh; a missing terminal to Windows Terminal (under WSL), the system default terminal, any installed one, and finally a detached tmux session when there is no desktop at all. Either way the session still opens and you're told which one fell back and why.

macOS

Saved from	Reopens in
zsh / bash / fish / sh in Terminal or iTerm2	a new window of the same app with the same shell (via AppleScript)
Ghostty, kitty, WezTerm or Alacritty	a new window of the same terminal
tmux	a new window in the same tmux session (recreated detached if tmux was restarted)
Warp, VS Code / editor terminal, unknown	Terminal (they can't be opened with a command)

Fallbacks. A missing shell falls back to zsh, then bash, then sh; a missing terminal to Terminal (it ships with every Mac), then any other installed one, then a detached tmux session.

Permission. The first restore into Terminal or iTerm2 makes macOS ask whether the app running Claude may control it. If that's refused, the session is reported as skipped (automation-denied) rather than lost — also when the prompt is left unanswered for 45 seconds: allow it in System Settings › Privacy & Security › Automation and restore again.

Overrides. Ask for a different shell for one restore, or set a default ("always restore in Git Bash"); the default is kept in the plugin's data folder and can be cleared any time.

How it works

Finding live sessions. Claude Code keeps a small file per running session in ~/.claude/sessions/. The plugin reads it and checks each entry against the actual process (PID and start time), so leftovers from crashed sessions and reused PIDs are ignored. Only terminal sessions are offered: sessions of Claude Desktop (and Cowork), the VS Code extension panel, headless runs (claude -p, the SDK) and other apps belong to those apps and are left out (Claude Code running in a VS Code terminal is a terminal session and is kept). If that folder is ever missing or its format changes, it falls back to transcripts written in the last 12 hours.
Labels. Each session is shown by its title (your /rename title, else Claude's generated one), folder, and last prompt.
Storage. The saved set is a single small JSON file in the plugin's own data folder (~/.claude/plugins/data/sessions-vslipchenko/snapshots/), which survives reboots and plugin updates. Nothing piles up: each save replaces the previous file. If the previous set still has sessions that were never restored, save asks before replacing it, so a mistaken save later on can't wipe what you meant to restore. A default shell, if you set one, is kept next to it in config.json. Uninstalling the plugin deletes the folder unless you pass --keep-data.
Clean start. Restored sessions are fully independent: the markers Claude Code gives to processes started from inside a session (child-session flag, session id, messaging socket) are removed before launching, so each resumed session keeps saving its own transcript. So are the "no colour" switch Claude sets for its tool commands and the description of the terminal restore ran in, so each session comes back in full colour and sees its own terminal.
Restoring. Sessions reopen in the order you originally opened them (Windows Terminal tabs left to right, windows one after another). Sessions that are already open are skipped, as are sessions whose folder or conversation no longer exists, and you're told which and why.

Limits

Only conversations come back. Dev servers, watchers and other processes started inside a session are not restarted.
A reply that is still being generated when a session is closed is lost; let busy sessions finish first.
Claude Code deletes old conversations after its retention period (cleanupPeriodDays, default 30 days); those can't be resumed.
macOS is not yet tested on a real Mac. Everything that can run on GitHub's macOS runners is tested there (session discovery from ps, shell and terminal detection, every restore plan, the session manager). Still unchecked: windows actually opening in Terminal, iTerm2, Ghostty, kitty, WezTerm and Alacritty, the Automation permission prompt, and the exact procStart format in Claude Code's session files on macOS (any format falls back to a safe process-name check). Reports from Mac users are welcome.
Other AI CLIs are not supported yet.

Without Claude

The script can also be run directly, e.g. to restore without first opening a Claude session:

On Windows:

$p = Get-ChildItem "$env:USERPROFILE\.claude\plugins\cache\vslipchenko\sessions" -Directory | Sort-Object Name | Select-Object -Last 1
powershell -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File "$($p.FullName)\scripts\sessions.ps1" restore

On Linux and macOS:

p=$(ls -d ~/.claude/plugins/cache/vslipchenko/sessions/*/ | sort -V | tail -1)
python3 "$p/scripts/sessions.py" restore

Commands: list, save -Ids <id,...> [-Force], snapshots, restore [-Ids <id,...>] [-UseShell <shell>] [-Terminal <terminal>] [-DryRun], config [-UseShell ...] [-Terminal ...] [-Reset], clear [-Force] [-IncludeConfig], manage [-Enable [-Ids <id,...>] [-Force] | -Disable].

License

MIT

Source: https://github.com/vslipchenko/ai/tree/main/plugins/sessions · Privacy policy · Support