Cannot copy text from Claude responses in interactive TUI (GNOME Terminal, Ubuntu 24.04)

Status Open
Reported on v2.1.142
Maintainer reply None cached
Activity 13 comments · opened May 26, 2026

Environment

  • Claude Code: 2.1.142
  • OS: Ubuntu 24.04
  • Terminal: GNOME Terminal

Description

In the interactive TUI, it is impossible to copy text from Claude's responses to the clipboard. The issue is specific to Claude's response area — copying works normally for all other terminal content.

Steps to reproduce

  1. Start an interactive session: claude
  2. Send any message and wait for a response
  3. Select text from Claude's response with the mouse
  4. Press Ctrl+Shift+C to copy

Expected behavior

Selected text is copied to the clipboard.

Actual behavior

Clipboard is unchanged (previous clipboard content is retained). Right-click context menu also does not work in the response area.

Additional finding

X11 primary selection works — text selected in the response area can be pasted via middle-click. Only the clipboard copy (Ctrl+Shift+C) is broken, suggesting Claude Code intercepts the shortcut in the response area without copying to clipboard.

Workaround

  • Middle-click paste after selecting
  • Use claude -p "question" in a separate terminal tab for plain copyable output

View original on GitHub ↗

13 Comments

rogpeppe · 4 months ago

FWIW /tui default fixed this issue for me.

jesup · 4 months ago

I have the same thing in /tui fullscreen on Fedora 43 - not only does it not auto-copy (though it says it does) but ctrl-shift-C doesn't copy either. /tui default makes it work again.

jesup · 4 months ago

I'll note that the workarounds given (middle-click) does not work for me

mdengler · 3 months ago
FWIW /tui default fixed this issue for me.

This doesn't fix the issue for me and significantly changes other claude code behavior (e.g., #826), so it's not really a great workaround.

Amarjit · 3 months ago
FWIW /tui default fixed this issue for me.

Works for me. The issue only occurred when switching to tui fullscreen a few weeks back.

mdengler · 3 months ago
Works for me.

/tui fullscreen works for you?

The issue only occurred when switching to tui fullscreen a few weeks back.

This is exactly the issue: cannot copy text from Claude responses in interactive TUI with /tui fullscreen.

Amarjit · 3 months ago
ue: cannot copy text from Claude responses in interactive TU

No, /tui default works for me.

When I updated Claude a few weeks back, it asked me to try the new fullscreen mode - which I did. This is when I couldn't copy text via mouse. That's the only connection I can make where I started having this issue.

myifaisal · 3 months ago

I was able to isolate the mouse selection / copy issue to the fullscreen TUI setting.

The issue occurs when this exists in ~/.claude/settings.json:

{
  "tui": "fullscreen"
}

Environment tested:

SHELL=/bin/bash
TERM=xterm-256color
Connection=SSH
OS=Ubuntu and AlmaLinux

Symptoms:

  • Mouse text selection does not work reliably inside Claude Code.
  • Copying selected terminal text fails or becomes inconsistent.
  • The same SSH client and terminal work normally outside Claude Code.

I tested this on both Ubuntu and AlmaLinux servers. After removing only "tui": "fullscreen" from ~/.claude/settings.json and restarting Claude Code, mouse selection/copy worked normally on both systems.

Workaround:

python3 - <<'PY'
import json, pathlib

p = pathlib.Path.home() / ".claude" / "settings.json"

data = {}
if p.exists():
    try:
        data = json.loads(p.read_text())
    except Exception:
        data = {}

data.pop("tui", None)

p.parent.mkdir(parents=True, exist_ok=True)
p.write_text(json.dumps(data, indent=2) + "\n")
print(p.read_text())
PY

I also confirmed the behavior by restoring the old config with "tui": "fullscreen"; the issue returned immediately. Removing it fixed the issue again.

This appears to be related to fullscreen TUI mode capturing or altering terminal mouse/input behavior in SSH sessions.

Amarjit · 3 months ago
does not work reliably inside Claude Code. Copying selected terminal text fails or becomes inconsistent. * The same SSH client and terminal work normally outside Claude Code. I tested this on both Ubuntu and AlmaLinux servers. After removing only "tui": "fullscreen" from ~/.claude/settings.json and restarting Claude Code, mouse selection/copy worked normally on both systems.

Thanks for proving it with the config. Also confirmed same issue

norandom · 2 months ago

Confirming issue on Mate Desktop (Gnome 2) as well. This fullscreen renderer also prevents logging in, because of the token back and forth process for the claude code client login. Biggest problem is with my VMs that the company wants us to use for sandboxing. It's a Red Hat based solution with Parallels (Gnome 3).

mdengler · 2 months ago
> ue: cannot copy text from Claude responses in interactive TU No, /tui default works for me.

This issue is about /tui fullscreen breaking the clipboard, not /tui default breaking the clipboard. If /tui default allows cut & paste, that's not this issue. "When I turn my steering wheel to the left, the brakes fail" does not have a workaround "do not turn left, just turn right three times".

When I updated Claude a few weeks back, it asked me to try the new fullscreen mode - which I did. This is when I couldn't copy text via mouse. That's the only connection I can make where I started having this issue.

Seems like you do/did indeed have the issue that /tui fullscreen breaks cut & paste, like the rest of the people I see commenting.

The good news is that I tried /tui fullscreen again now in v2.1.220 and both select+middle-click and select+C-S-c/v work now, so that's pretty good.

Amarjit · 2 months ago
This issue is about /tui fullscreen breaking the clipboard, not /tui default breaking the clipboard. If /tui default allows cut & paste, that's not this issue.

The issue was about not being able to copy text. I and others collaborated to determine it was fullscreen mode that caused the issue. @myifaisal proved it through config.

"When I turn my steering wheel to the left, the brakes fail" does not have a workaround "do not turn left, just turn right three times".

Worth keeping threads like this collaborative rather than adversarial. Makes it easier to actually track down root causes.

Seems like you do/did indeed have the issue that /tui fullscreen breaks cut & paste, like the rest of the people I see commenting. The good news is that I tried /tui fullscreen again now in v2.1.220 and both select+middle-click and select+C-S-c/v work now, so that's pretty good.

Thank you for confirming.

mdengler · 2 months ago
> This issue is about /tui fullscreen breaking the clipboard, not /tui default breaking the clipboard. If /tui default allows cut & paste, that's not this issue. The issue was about not being able to copy text. I and others collaborated to determine it was fullscreen mode that caused the issue. @myifaisal proved it through config.

I think we agree the issue was about not being about to copy text to the clipboard; if you were copying text somewhere else than the clipboard, maybe there is a different issue.

> "When I turn my steering wheel to the left, the brakes fail" does not have a workaround "do not turn left, just turn right three times". Worth keeping threads like this collaborative rather than adversarial. Makes it easier to actually track down root causes.

I replied to a different user about the how /tui default was not a useful workaround and you replied to me with the same (IMO) confusion; I now infer (after two replies to you before this "adversarial" comment) that you have a different opinion as to whether /tui default is a useful workaround. It's ok if the workaround for you is not a workaround for me; hopefully the brakes analogy expresses the level of insufficiency for me, but I wasn't trying to imply anything other than a disagreement about the "it's a workaround" opinion.

> Seems like you do/did indeed have the issue that /tui fullscreen breaks cut & paste, like the rest of the people I see commenting. > The good news is that I tried /tui fullscreen again now in v2.1.220 and both select+middle-click and select+C-S-c/v work now, so that's pretty good. Thank you for confirming.

Can you confirm this as well?