A menu-bar toggle asks Claude Code to cut the chatter and get to the point
Want Claude Code to cut the chatter and get straight to the point? A new menu-bar toggle handles it. This new switch, "Terse Mode", asks Claude Code to answer more tersely for your entire session (session — one continuous stretch of a conversation) — trimming hedging (hedge — words that soften the claim without committing, like "maybe, perhaps, I'm not entirely sure"), filler (empty words that pad length but carry no information), and the repeated preamble it prints every time it starts; but it leaves code, commands, file paths, and error messages byte-exact, so not a single technical detail is altered. It runs fully on your own machine (it's really just a SessionStart hook — a small setup script that runs automatically whenever a new conversation starts, making no API call), and is off by default. Once on, it announces itself at the start of your first reply — folded into the Progress Concierge's greeting if that other feature (an opener that greets you at the start of a session) is also on, or on its own line otherwise. Note that, like any "style instruction", it's a request rather than a hard constraint: in a very long conversation it can gradually fade and drift back to Claude's normal verbosity, at which point a one-line reminder brings it back. It's like telling a talkative coworker "keep it short, just the point"; they'll trim their words, but as the chat rolls on they'll unconsciously start rambling again — at which point a single cleared throat is enough to rein them in.