[BUG] Desktop app sidebar shows only ~30 of 378 CLI sessions (Windows, v2.1.109)

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?

The desktop app sidebar is only showing ~30 of 378 CLI sessions. The missing sessions include recently created, titled sessions from the last 2 weeks. This is the same core issue as #22723 (closed), which was never actually resolved.

Detailed Investigation

I ran a thorough investigation of the session storage on my machine:

The numbers:

• 378 CLI session files in ~/.claude/projects/ (.jsonl files across 20 project directories)
• 33 sessions have custom titles (set via /rename)
• ~30 sessions visible in the desktop sidebar
• ~20 recently titled sessions are completely missing from the sidebar

Missing titled sessions (all from the last 2 weeks):

• STREAMDECK BUILDS (4/14)
• STREAMDECK 2 (4/14)
• DISCORD CHANNELS BOT (4/14)
• FLOURISH WEB APP (4/13)
• FLOURISH PLEIN AIR MAP (4/13)
• 2025 INCOME TAXES (4/13)
• Stream Deck Workshop (4/12)
• Claude Startup Files (4/12)
• AI Organization (4/12)
• Claude Communication Options (4/11)
• AI Clubhouse (4/11)
• Claude Code CLI Log Dev (4/10)
• WORKFLOWY MCP (3/30)
• ...and several more

Sessions that DO appear include:

• PHONE IT IN 4/14/2026 ✓
• Karpathy RAG (4/10) ✓
• clark-brothers-adventure-game (4/9) ✓
• Some untitled sessions with auto-generated names ("Hey", "Hello", "Interactive session") ✓

No consistent pattern determines which sessions appear vs. don't. It's not date-based (recent sessions are missing), not title-based (some titled sessions appear, some don't), and not directory-based (sessions from the same project directory are split between visible and invisible).

Storage Investigation

The desktop app's %AppData%/Claude/claude-code-sessions/ directory contains 38 session JSON files, but most are archived scheduled-task runs. However, the sidebar shows sessions that are not in this directory (like "PHONE IT IN", "Karpathy RAG"), confirming the sidebar also reads from the cloud API. The cloud session registry appears to be incomplete — only some CLI sessions get registered.

Environment

• CLI: Claude Code 2.1.109
• Desktop: Claude Desktop (Windows Store app)
• OS: Windows 11 Pro 10.0.26200
• Auth: OAuth (claude.ai account, Max subscription)

Expected Behavior

All CLI sessions (or at minimum all titled/renamed sessions) should appear in the desktop app sidebar, matching what claude --resume shows in the terminal.

Actual Behavior

Only ~30 of 378 sessions appear. No consistent rule governs which sessions are visible. Many recently created, actively titled sessions are missing.

Related Issues

• #22723 (closed, same core issue — "Desktop app 'Local' sessions filter doesn't show CLI sessions")
• #25524 (closed as duplicate of #22723)
• #33363 (closed as duplicate)
• #31787 (closed as duplicate, Windows-specific)

All were closed but the underlying problem persists.