[BUG] Windows: All Claude Code sessions silently deleted during background update — no migration, no recovery path

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?

Environment

• OS: Windows 11, Version 25H2 (OS Build 26200.8246)
• Claude Code version (at time of incident): unable to determine — the version is not exposed in the Desktop app UI before the pending update is applied, and claude --version is not available in PATH. The pending update offered in the sidebar is v1.7196.0; the installed version at the time of data loss was therefore the release immediately preceding 1.7196.0.
• Plan: Pro
• Mode: Claude Code Desktop App (Windows installer build)

Summary

After what appears to have been a silent background update on the morning of 2026-05-13 (~08:52 local time, Berlin), all Claude Code sessions disappeared from the Desktop app sidebar. The Recents list is empty, dashboard counters show 0 (sessions, messages, tokens, active days, streaks). I did not knowingly trigger an update.

Crucially, unlike issues #29172, #25524, and #27752 — where the .jsonl session files remained intact on disk and only the UI failed to display them — in my case the session files appear to have been deleted, not merely unindexed. No recovery path exists.

Evidence

1. No .jsonl files exist anywhere under the user profile

Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\Users\Amanda" -Filter "*.jsonl" -Recurse -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue `
  | Select-Object FullName, Length, LastWriteTime `
  | Sort-Object LastWriteTime -Descending `
  | Format-Table -AutoSize
# Returns nothing.

2. The expected storage directory has been removed

C:\Users\Amanda\AppData\Roaming\Claude\ no longer exists. The Explorer reports: "Windows can't find 'C:\Users\Amanda\AppData\Roaming\Claude'."

3. Local .claude\sessions\ exists but is empty

C:\Users\Amanda\.claude\sessions\ exists as an empty directory.

4. Cache folder names point to the old (now-deleted) storage path

This is the forensic smoking gun. The Electron cache at C:\Users\Amanda\AppData\Local\claude-cli-nodejs\Cache\ still contains folders whose names literally encode the old session path:

• C--Users-Amanda-AppData-Roaming-Claude-local-agent-mode-sessions-f7be1fbe-6d0a-4a1d-af00-fe13a6fb184f-8440f... (modified 2026-05-12 09:31)
• C--Users-Amanda-AppData-Roaming-Claude-local-agent-mode-sessions-f7be1fbe-6d0a-4a1d-af00-fe13a6fb184f-8440f... (modified 2026-05-11 11:31)

This is the exact legacy location described in issue #29373 (local-agent-mode-sessions). The cache entries prove sessions were being stored there until at least 2026-05-12. The directory itself was then removed during the update.

5. Backup files modified at update time

.claude.json and the backups in C:\Users\Amanda\.claude\backups\ (.claude.json.backup.1775649056686, .claude.json.backup.1778655158314) were both modified at 2026-05-13 08:52 — consistent with an automatic update at that timestamp. The backups contain only config data, not session content.

6. No Windows Previous Versions / File History snapshots exist

Right-click → Properties → Previous Versions on AppData\Roaming\ returns: "There are no previous versions available." File History was not enabled on this machine.

7. claude.ai web recovery is not available for Pro

https://claude.ai/code redirects to /family for my Pro account — Claude Code Web (Research Preview) is not accessible. The "Delete server-side copies" button in account settings therefore appears to reference a feature my account does not have. No server-side recovery is possible.

Difference from Related Issues

| Issue | Their symptom | My case |
|---|---|---|
| #29172 | .jsonl files intact, UI fails to index | Files gone, not just unindexed |
| #25524 | Sidebar empty, files intact in .claude/projects/ | .claude\projects\ does not exist; files gone |
| #27752 | History empty in UI, resumable via claude --resume | claude --resume cannot find anything; claude not in PATH |
| #53717 | Sidebar shows sessions but content is 0-KB stubs | No sidebar entries at all, no .jsonl files at all |
| #29373 | Sessions remain in legacy local-agent-mode-sessions/ after migration | Legacy directory itself was deleted during update |

My case combines the worst aspects of #29373 (failed migration) and #53717 (true data loss) — the legacy directory was removed without the new directory being populated.

Impact

Weeks of conversation context around an active production project at AMBOSS SE (Berlin) — a Streamlit "command center" for CME (Continuing Medical Education) workflows, ÄKB portal automation, Playwright scripts, and Google Apps Script for certificate generation. The code itself is unaffected (versioned separately, on disk) — only the conversational history is lost. This includes architectural decisions, debugging traces, and step-by-step development context that cannot be reconstructed.

Requests to Anthropic

1. Recovery guidance if any remnant exists in a location I haven't checked (IndexedDB, LevelDB, Electron session storage, additional Electron caches).
2. Confirmation of root cause so I and other affected Pro users can make informed decisions about continued use of Claude Code Desktop on Windows.
3. An auto-update safeguard that refuses to proceed if migration of existing session data would fail, and explicitly prompts the user before any destructive operation on the session directory.
4. Expose the installed version in the UI without requiring the user to accept a pending update first — currently there is no way to report which version caused a regression.
5. Consider a "Cloud sessions" / backup option for Pro users, or at minimum a documented export path so users can self-backup before updates.

Related Issues

• #29373 — Claude Desktop update loses Code session history (legacy → new storage migration failure)
• #53717 — Windows: session content not flushed to disk
• #54428 — Full day of session work lost during silent restart
• #27752 — Session history disappears from UI after restart
• #25524 — Previous sessions not showing in desktop app sidebar
• #29172 — Sessions disappear from sidebar after restart
• #26452 — Session disappeared after logout/restart, no recovery from .claude/

What Should Happen?

Either:

1. The update migrates existing sessions from the legacy location to the new one, or
2. The legacy directory is preserved untouched so users can recover manually, or
3. The update refuses to proceed if migration of existing session data would fail, prompting the user.

Silent deletion of session content during a background update is data loss, not a UI bug.

Error Messages/Logs

No error messages — silent deletion. See Steps to Reproduce.

Steps to Reproduce

Cannot reproduce on demand. Timeline:

• 2026-05-12, evening: Sessions present and functional. Active development on a Streamlit project at C:\Users\Amanda\Documents\Code\Fragen erstellen\ribosom-automation\kommandozentrale\. Multiple Claude Code sessions for this and related projects, accumulated over weeks.
• 2026-05-13, ~08:52 (per file mtimes): Apparent silent update. .claude.json and backup files modified at this time. No user-visible update prompt or restart triggered by me.
• 2026-05-13, morning (user-observed): Desktop app opened. Sidebar empty. Dashboard zeros. Pending update v1.7196.0 visible in the sidebar (i.e., the update banner is still showing — suggesting the silent file modifications happened during a pre-update preparation phase, not after I accepted the update).

Claude Model

Opus

Is this a regression?

Yes, this worked in a previous version

Last Working Version

2026-05-12 evening session

Claude Code Version

Unable to determine — version not exposed in Desktop UI before accepting pending update; claude --version not in PATH. Pending update offered: v1.7196.0 (see report body for details).

Platform

Anthropic API

Operating System

Windows

Terminal/Shell

PowerShell

Additional Information

Screenshots

1. Empty Claude Code dashboard — the symptom (Recents empty, all counters at 0)
<img width="1903" height="989" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/3c4458b4-ed1d-4e7f-ae3b-0ff6ab079de4" />

2. PowerShell: zero .jsonl files anywhere under user profile (Evidence #1)
<img width="1152" height="375" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/722fb818-6dbc-4996-99a1-f793d3637965" />

3. AppData\Roaming\Claude\ no longer exists — Explorer error dialog (Evidence #2)
<img width="919" height="271" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/e9c39b67-7567-4d0f-80fe-d95b4a3f2c5d" />

4. .claude\sessions\ exists but is empty (Evidence #3)
<img width="1121" height="727" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/c2a84c99-991a-4271-9c2d-516056b7588c" />

5. Cache folders still reference deleted legacy local-agent-mode-sessions path — the forensic smoking gun (Evidence #4)
<img width="1572" height="624" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/05b8f199-b2c7-481f-9f82-51222d68b6cb" />

6. .claude\backups\ modified at 08:52 on update day (Evidence #5)
<img width="1096" height="571" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/d8ce6a3e-bcaa-4d39-b254-60bc1d5e1fc6" />

7. No File History / Previous Versions snapshots available (Evidence #6)
<img width="369" height="508" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/69706d56-3a5f-4dac-a780-b863119021d6" />

8. claude.ai/code redirects to /family — Claude Code Web not available for Pro (Evidence #7)
<img width="1862" height="994" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/3097d6af-01d3-4f7b-90f4-0f6796866241" />