Native memory leak (node-pty) on Node v24 + macOS Darwin

Description

Claude Code v2.1.72 exhibits a native memory leak on macOS (Darwin 25.3.0) with Node.js v24.3.0. The leak is in native addons (likely node-pty), not in the V8 JavaScript heap.

Diagnostics

• CC Version: 2.1.72
• Node Version: v24.3.0
• Platform: darwin (Darwin 25.3.0)
• Trigger: manual heap dump after ~57 seconds of uptime

Memory Usage

| Metric | Value |
|--------|-------|
| heapUsed | 118 MB |
| heapTotal | 49 MB |
| external | 77 MB |
| arrayBuffers | 21 MB |
| RSS | 327 MB |

Growth Rate

• ~5.7 MB/s (~19.8 GB/hour)

Analysis

• Native memory (118 MB) exceeds V8 heap (49 MB), indicating the leak is in native addons (node-pty, sharp, etc.), not in JavaScript
• heapUsed > heapTotal confirms memory is being allocated outside the managed V8 heap
• maxRSS reported as 659 GB (likely a measurement/unit anomaly)

Steps to Reproduce

1. Run Claude Code v2.1.72 on macOS with Node.js v24.3.0
2. Take a heap dump after ~1 minute (/heapdump)
3. Observe native memory significantly exceeding V8 heap and high growth rate

Expected Behavior

Memory usage should stabilize after initial startup, not grow at ~5.7 MB/s indefinitely.

Heap Snapshot

A .heapsnapshot file is available and can be shared if needed for further analysis in Chrome DevTools.