[BUG] Remote Control: Bridge poll returns 401 despite valid OAuth login (Max subscription)

Status Fixed / completed

Reported on v2.1.63

Maintainer reply None cached

Activity 7 comments · opened Mar 2, 2026 · closed Mar 3, 2026

Preflight Checklist

[x] I have searched existing issues and this hasn't been reported yet
[x] This is a single bug report
[x] I am using the latest version of Claude Code

What's Wrong?

Remote Control feature consistently fails with a 401 authentication error during the bridge poll step, even after full re-authentication via claude logout + claude login. This is from the CLI directly (not the VS Code extension). Normal API usage (conversations) works fine — only the Remote Control bridge is affected.

What Should Happen?

The Remote Control bridge should successfully register, create a session, and begin polling for work without authentication errors.

Error Messages/Logs

[bridge:api] POST /v1/environments/bridge -> 200 (registration succeeds)
[bridge] Session creation request failed: Request failed with status code 503
[bridge:work] Starting poll loop
[ERROR] BridgeFatalError: BridgeFatalError: Poll: Authentication failed (401): Invalid OAuth token. The provided token was not found or is malformed.. Remote Control is only available with claude.ai subscriptions. Please use `/login` to sign in with your claude.ai account.
[bridge:api] DELETE /v1/environments/bridge/env_... (cleanup)

Auth status at time of error:

{
  "loggedIn": true,
  "authMethod": "claude.ai",
  "apiProvider": "firstParty",
  "subscriptionType": "max"
}

Steps to Reproduce

Run claude from the CLI (not VS Code)
Verify auth: claude auth status shows logged in with Max subscription
Remote Control bridge attempts to start automatically
Bridge registration succeeds (200) but session creation fails with 503, then poll immediately fails with 401
claude logout followed by claude login does not resolve the issue
Running only a single CLI instance does not resolve the issue

Claude Model

Opus

Is this a regression?

I don't know

Claude Code Version

2.1.63 (Claude Code)

Platform

Anthropic API

Operating System

macOS

Terminal/Shell

Terminal.app (macOS)

Additional Information

macOS 26.3 (Tahoe), Apple Silicon (arm64)
Auth method: claude.ai OAuth (Max subscription)
The session creation 503/500 errors may be the root cause, with the 401 on poll being a secondary effect
The issue reproduces across multiple project directories simultaneously

View original on GitHub ↗

7 Comments

GoMino · 6 months ago

Same issue here

siriwatknp · 6 months ago

Same here. I'm on Max plan x5

github-actions[bot] · 6 months ago

Found 3 possible duplicate issues:

This issue will be automatically closed as a duplicate in 3 days.

If your issue is a duplicate, please close it and 👍 the existing issue instead
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🤖 Generated with Claude Code

karimStekelenburg · 6 months ago

Hi there! I was running into a similar issue with my 20x Max subscription and nothing seemed to work for me. Then I noticed that the output of claude auth status did not change, even after running claude code logout.

So then I did the following:

Run claude auth status to check your login status. For me, it only showed: { loggedIn: true, authMethod: OAuth, apiProvider: firstParty}
Remove CLAUDE_CODE_OAUTH_TOKEN from your .zshrc if set (I had previously set this myself)
Open up a new shell (or run unset CLAUDE_CODE_OAUTH_TOKEN)
Remove all entries related to claude from the macos keychain
Go to claude.ai -> settings -> claude code -> revoke ALL authorization tokens
Run claude and try to send a message to confirm the logout
Open Claude Desktop to confirm logout
Uninstall claude code (on macos you can run rm -f ~/.local/bin/claude ~/.local/share/claude)
Restart my machine (just to be sure)
Open Claude Desktop and log back in
Reinstall Claude Code (curl -fsSL https://claude.ai/install.sh | bash)
Run claude auth status to verify you're still logged out (loggedIn should be false)
Run claude code login to log back in
Rerun claude code status to confirm the login. You should now see a different output from the first time you ran this command. For me, it now showed my email, orgId, orgName and subscriptionType in addition to the values shown in the first step. Most notably, it now has authMethod set to claude.ai instead of OAuth.

After this, everything seems to work for me.

Hope this helps!

jmlallier · 6 months ago

The issue seems to be resolved for me today without my having done anything to resolve it. I assume the issue was server-side and has been fixed, as the Claude Code version is still 2.1.63.