Skills issues on VS Code
Issues the maintainers labelled both platform:vscode and area:skills.
73 issues · 18 open · 55 resolved (75%) · first seen Feb 28, 2026
Is this getting better or worse?
This class of problem is converging. 17 new reports in the last 90 days vs 35 in the 90 before — -51%. The open backlog peaked at 18 in 2026-10 and sits at 18 today.
Derived by counting each matching issue from its creation date until it closed. First-party
computation over the anthropics/claude-code tracker — the trend is not published
anywhere upstream.
Which builds report this
55 of these reports name the Claude Code build they were running, spanning 48 releases. Heaviest reporters:
- Claude Code v2.1.76
- Claude Code v2.1.288
- Claude Code v2.1.207
- Claude Code v2.1.142
- Claude Code v2.1.140
- Claude Code v2.1.110
- Claude Code v2.1.296
- Claude Code v2.1.294
Report volume, not a defect count: an issue can mention a build without that build having caused the failure. Versions come from the version string in the bug-report template, matched against real published tags.
Do these get fixed?
Median time to close is 31 days across 55 closures. Of the 55 closures with a recorded reason, 22% were closed as completed and 43 as not-planned or duplicate. The most recent completed fix landed in 2026-09.
Workarounds reported by the community
19 of these issues post a workaround someone says worked. The highest-engagement ones:
- [BUG] Invoking a skill (slash command) pins a large injected block and shrinks the assistant response into a tiny scroll area (VS Code extension)
- …. - So there's no userland (hooks/settings/skill-authoring) workaround — this needs a fix in the extension's message renderer itself: apply the same "Show more" collapse to skill-injected content that already applies to…
Found in the thread of #72590 · resolved - AskUserQuestion widget renders only header then hangs in VS Code extension (macOS, called from Skill)
- …ers; the interactive card never appears; the session hangs. Workaround found clears the stuck UI state; re-running the skill usually renders the widget on the next attempt. So it appears to be an intermittent rendering-p…
Found in the description of #70438 · still open - VS Code extension: "Skill must provide a name" warning is incorrect for plugin-namespaced skills
- …rkspace authors can override validation behavior themselves Workaround Attempted Added with — but this setting name is a guess, as no suppression setting is documented. Environment - Claude Code VS Code extension (latest…
Found in the description of #42782 · resolved - [BUG] v2.1.143: silent render-miss after upstream stream stall in skill-scoped turn (follow-up to #58897, fix incomplete)
- …uld re-render the full conversation from disk (matching the workaround reported by the author of 58984), but in my case it does not recover the truncated render either. Error Messages/Logs No banner in the UI for this ma…
Found in the description of #60166 · resolved - Claude Design preview: artifact comments can't anchor to design elements — anchors collapse to editor-chrome selectors
- …rong with it. Today that pointing is silently lost, and the workaround is asking users to write out an address in prose ("[Frame title → the block titled 'X']") — which works for technical users and is a real usability c…
Found in the description of #88710 · still open
Excerpts are quoted from the linked issue so you can judge relevance before opening it. Threads that only ask for a workaround, or report that there is none, are excluded. These are community suggestions, not official guidance from Anthropic — read the full thread before applying one.
Matching issues 1–73
Ranked by community engagement (reactions weighted over comments).
- VS Code extension skill validator rejects valid frontmatter fields
- [BUG] Invoking a skill (slash command) pins a large injected block and shrinks the assistant response into a tiny scroll area (VS Code extension)
- [BUG] VSCode: ide_selection and ide_opened_file missing on first message when using a skill
- AskUserQuestion widget renders only header then hangs in VS Code extension (macOS, called from Skill)
- [Bug] /loop /clear command not working
- [BUG] VSCode: sessions started with slash command never appear in Past Conversations history
- [BUG] Skill invocation prompt is blocking the output.
- VS Code extension: "Skill must provide a name" warning is incorrect for plugin-namespaced skills
- [BUG] VSCode: ide_selection and ide_opened_file missing on first message when using a skill
- [BUG] v2.1.143: silent render-miss after upstream stream stall in skill-scoped turn (follow-up to #58897, fix incomplete)
- Skill/agent persona output doesn't collapse, shrinks visible text area
- VS Code extension: skill invocation no longer shows visual badge (regression since ~2.1.110)
- [Bug] Skill invocation and instruction retention degradation
- Claude Design preview: artifact comments can't anchor to design elements — anchors collapse to editor-chrome selectors
- [BUG] VSCode Slash-command autocomplete doesn't show available skills until after first message
- Skills added mid-session (e.g. via `git switch` to a branch that adds `.claude/skills/<name>/`) are registered for the Skill tool but never appear in the slash-command menu; `/reload-skills` reports "no changes" and does not fix it
- IDE slash-command palette doesn't index newly-added symlinked skills until window reload
- [BUG] paths: frontmatter never triggers skill auto-loading when Claude reads/edits a matching file
- [BUG] Flat ``.md-files`` in ``/.claude/skills/`` silently ignored — no error, confusing given "merged" messaging
- [BUG] When Bash(mkdir:*) is listed in allowed-tools, Claude still prompts for permission
- VS Code extension: skill/slash-command messages with long arguments are never collapsible (no "Show more"/"Show less") and the sticky header hides Claude's response
- [BUG] VS Code skill invocation is blocking output
- `deep-research` skill permanently disappears from autocomplete after a session hits usage limit mid-run (all other built-in skills unaffected)
- [BUG] Max user, Claude unusable 3x issues - 1. 1M context error 2. repeated auto compaction after 1/2 messages 3. Single word prompt "too long"
- Third-party marketplace plugins cannot register skills/commands/agents
- [BUG] Custom project slash commands missing from / picker on Remote Control; /feedback unavailable on Remote Control and VSCode extension
- Custom skills no longer working after new installation caused a name collision between bundled skill and custom skill
- [BUG] v2.1.140 VS Code extension on Windows: project skills missing from slash-command autocomplete (#9710 / #32331 cluster unfixed)
- [FEATURE] Allow plan-preview UI for skill-generated plans/specs, not only ExitPlanMode
- [Bug] Anthropic API Error: Dedup stage crash on /ultrareview with no findings and misleading billing
- [BUG] Skills with `disable-model-invocation: true` intermittently fail on user invocation in VS Code extension
- My project skills don't auto-load as commands in Claude Code
- [BUG] When @-mentioning a file in skill argument, "Read file (NNN lines)" is printed, but file is not in the context.
- [BUG] Command history dispatch matches wrong skill when one skill name is a prefix of another
- [BUG] (lsp) skill name validation rejects valid colon-namespaced names
- bug(vscode): Skill tool crashes with EEXIST when home dir is used as working directory on Windows
- [Bug] Plugin skills shadow built-in commands when names collide
- VS Code extension does not render skill argument-hint in slash menu (works in terminal)
- [Bug] Memory rules ignored when marketplace SKILLS present in context
- [Bug] NameError in orchestrator error handler crashes Bug Hunter review on agent failure
- [BUG] [VS Code Extension] Organization-level skills not loaded (only filesystem paths checked)
- [Bug] bash: .claude/hooks/skill-instructions-hook.sh: No such file or directory
- Forked-skill Agent dispatch fails in VSCode extension 2.1.140 — sub-agent loses skill context and tool whitelist
- [BUG]VS Code extension: slash command triggers API Error: Content block not found
- [BUG] /review deprecation issue:
- [Bug] Quota consumed on /ultrareview crash before findings generation
- Skill tool's forked execution describes plugin skills instead of running them; ignores `context` frontmatter field
- Opus 4.7 (1M): repeated failures in a working repo with documented tooling — 20 logged mistakes across multiple sessions
- Discover project commands/skills from additional working directories (--add-dir)
- [Bug] /start-data1 command suggested in wrong repository
- IDE validator rejects officially supported skill frontmatter attributes (context, agent, etc.)
- [BUG] custom commands are not being loaded in vs code extension
- VS Code extension rejects valid skill frontmatter: context, agent, allowed-tools
- [BUG] Skills visible in Customize UI but not invocable as slash commands when located in project directory
- VS Code: skill autocomplete resolves wrong skill when typing exact name
- [Bug] Skills not loading in intended scenarios
- [Bug] Usage attribution overstates skills with handoffs and inconsistent subagent handling
- [BUG] Bare skill-only slash command as first message in a new session sometimes hangs indefinitely (never reaches "Thinking...")
- Skill 'model:' frontmatter not applied in VS Code extension — UI shows correct model, session runs previous one
- [Feature Request] Allow skills to pre-fill next terminal input line or execute /commands
- [BUG] VS Code extension: namespaced /plugin:skill form shows “No matching commands” and cannot be submitted; skills whose name matches a built-in command are unreachable
- [Bug] Insights skill doesn't detect C++ file changes (.cpp, .cc, .cxx, .hpp, .hh, .ipp)
- [Bug] Auto mode safety check blocks writing skill files
- [BUG] VS Code: prompt history drops slash-command arguments
- [BUG] VS Code extension still ignores model: frontmatter in slash commands on v2.1.288 (TUI fixed in 2.1.280, #81318)
- [Feature Request] Add multi-turn conversation support for slash commands
- [Bug] Claude ignores direct questions mid-turn and continues tool calls without responding
- [BUG] Attribute 'effort' is not supported by VS Code skills. Supported: argument-hint, compatibility, context, description, disable-model-invocation, license, metadata, name, user-invocable.
- [FEATURE] VS Code integration: support contributes.chatSkills for parity with GitHub Copilot
- Model questions and then overrides explicit live instruction with generic skill procedure and prints secrets in plain text
- [BUG] Blank screen / rendering freeze when a slash command auto-expands into a long input
- review skill runs local git checkout against working tree, can destroy uncommitted work
- [Bug] Unintended model fallback from Claude 3.5 Sonnet during /security-review built-in skill