Thinking blocks not expandable in VSCode extension on macOS
Resolved 💬 3 comments Opened May 15, 2026 by marketingmaniacs Closed May 18, 2026
Environment
- Claude Code VSCode extension v2.1.142 (darwin-arm64)
- macOS (Darwin 24.6.0)
- Extended thinking enabled (Effort: Medium)
Problem
Thinking blocks appear as a non-interactive bullet labeled "Thought for Xs" between user messages and assistant responses. There is no way to expand them and view the reasoning content:
- The bullet/label is not clickable — no hover state, no click handler
- No keyboard shortcut works:
Ctrl+OandCmd+Odo nothing for this - The Command Palette has no Claude command related to expanding/collapsing thinking
- Inspected
package.jsonof the installed extension — none of theclaude-vscode.*commands target thinking visibility
Expected
Either a clickable thinking block (like claude.ai web) or a documented keyboard shortcut to expand thinking content within the VSCode native extension.
Workaround
Use the terminal CLI (claude), where thinking is rendered inline and expanded by default.
Impact
Users on macOS using the VSCode extension cannot inspect the model's reasoning, which reduces trust and debuggability — especially relevant now that adaptive extended thinking is on by default.
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