[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?

Sidebar categories (Backlist, To Do, Doing, Waiting For) disappeared after several weeks of use

Environment

Claude desktop app version: 1.44121.4
Bundled Claude Code version: 2.1.258
macOS: 26.5.1 (build 25F80)

Description

I had set up four custom categories in the Claude Code sidebar: Backlist, To Do, Doing, and Waiting For. I used them for about two weeks, manually moving sessions between them to manage my work, similar to a kanban board. There was no automatic filtering or tagging involved. I moved sessions into a category myself each time.

Today the categories are gone. The sidebar now only shows Routines and project folders, with no way to see or recreate the four categories or the sessions that were sorted into them.

Steps taken

Fully quit and reopened the app. This did not restore the categories.

What I'm looking for

Confirmation on whether this data is recoverable on your end (if it was synced to my account rather than stored purely locally), and what caused it to disappear so I can avoid losing it again.

What Should Happen?

The four custom sidebar categories (Backlist, To Do, Doing, Waiting For) should still be present, along with the sessions I had sorted into them. Categories I create should persist across app restarts and not disappear without any action on my part.

Error Messages/Logs

None observed. The categories did not produce any error, they simply no longer appear in the sidebar.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Create custom categories in the Claude Code sidebar (in my case: Backlist, To Do, Doing, Waiting For).
2. Move chat sessions into these categories to organize ongoing work.
3. Continue using the app normally over an extended period (approximately two weeks in this case).
4. At some point, without any specific action taken to remove them, the categories and their session assignments disappear from the sidebar.
5. Quit and reopen the app. Categories do not return.

I was not able to identify a specific action that triggered the disappearance. They were present, then at some later session were simply gone.

Claude Model

Sonnet (default)

Is this a regression?

I don't know

Last Working Version

_No response_

Claude Code Version

Claude 1.44121.4 (0d57a2) 2026-09-02T23:50:20.000Z

Platform

Anthropic API

Operating System

macOS

Terminal/Shell

Other

Additional Information

This issue occurred in the Claude desktop app's Code tab (not a terminal-based session), so the terminal selection above doesn't apply.

Before filing this, I checked local app storage on my machine (~/.claude/, ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/, including config.json and browser storage such as IndexedDB and Session Storage) for any trace of the category names or a related data structure. I found nothing, which suggests this data may be stored server-side/synced to my account rather than purely local, or wasn't persisted as a distinct saved structure. I'm not certain of the underlying mechanism, just flagging what I ruled out on my end.