[BUG]

Preflight Checklist

• [x] I have searched existing issues and this hasn't been reported yet
• [x] This is a single bug report (please file separate reports for different bugs)
• [x] I am using the latest version of Claude Code

What's Wrong?

A crash triggers a notification in vscode:

"File changes watcher stopped unexpectedly. A reload of the window may enable the watcher again unless the workspace cannot be watched for file changes."

the moment you interact with the Claude Code extension panel. The extension is causing VS Code to kill and fail to restart its watcher.

This is a bug to report. Check which version of the Claude Code extension you have (Extensions sidebar → Claude Code → gear icon), then file it at anthropics/claude-code with:

VS Code 1.114.0 on Ubuntu 24.04
File watcher crashes immediately on clicking the Claude Code panel
Reproducible with all other extensions disabled
main.log shows: crashed with code 15 and reason 'killed'
In the meantime, the workaround is to use Claude Code via the terminal (Claude in a terminal tab) rather than the VS Code panel — same functionality, avoids triggering the watcher crash.

What Should Happen?

Claude code interactions in the chat should not blow up the file watcher. I used Claude to troubleshoot this and ultimately after many tries it decided I should report the bug.

Error Messages/Logs

File changes watcher stopped unexpectedly. A reload of the window may enable the watcher again unless the workspace cannot be watched for file changes.

Steps to Reproduce

Used Claude to actually troubleshoot this many times, changing permissions file limits all kinds of itterations.

Claude Model

Not sure / Multiple models

Is this a regression?

Yes, this worked in a previous version

Last Working Version

_No response_

Claude Code Version

2.1.92

Platform

Anthropic API

Operating System

Ubuntu/Debian Linux

Terminal/Shell

VS Code integrated terminal

Additional Information

_No response_