[!IMPORTANT]
The maintained backup agent skill now lives in
Tomstack.
Install and update the reusable skill from Tomstack. This repository remains
the supported home of the claude-backup CLI, scheduler, npm package,
standalone plugin, and runtime releases.

Every debugging session. Every architecture decision. Every prompt you spent an hour crafting. Gone.

WhatsApp keeps your messages forever. Telegram keeps them forever. Discord keeps them forever. Claude Code — the tool you pay $20–200/mo for — gives you 30 days.

npx claude-backup

What You're Losing

Claude Code stores everything in ~/.claude/ — your settings, custom agents, hooks, skills, and every conversation you've ever had. Sessions older than 30 days? Silently deleted.

Each session is:

• A debugging journal — the exact steps that fixed that impossible bug
• An architecture record — why you chose that pattern, with the AI's reasoning
• A prompt library — the carefully worded instructions that actually worked
• A learning log — mistakes, corrections, breakthroughs, all timestamped

You can't Google your own Claude sessions. Once they're gone, they're gone.

How It Works

npx claude-backup

Interactive setup:

1. Checks requirements (git, gzip, python3)
2. Creates a private GitHub repo (or local-only if you prefer)
3. Backs up your config and all sessions (gzipped)
4. Sets up automatic backups (configurable: daily, 6h, hourly)

That's it. Run it once, forget about it.

Get Your Sessions Back

Browse and restore any session from your backups:

# List all backed-up sessions
claude-backup restore --list

# Show the last 5 sessions
claude-backup restore --last 5

# Filter by date
claude-backup restore --date 2026-02-27

# Filter by project
claude-backup restore --project myproject

# Restore a specific session
claude-backup restore <uuid>

The session index is auto-generated on every sync and rebuilt from the *.jsonl.gz files — you never need to manage it manually.

What Gets Saved

Config profile — settings, CLAUDE.md, agents, hooks, skills, rules. Lightweight (< 100 KB), portable between machines.

Sessions archive — all chat history, compressed with gzip. Your entire conversation history, safe in a private repo.

All source paths are relative to ~/.claude/.

Machine Migration

Your config took hours to perfect. Move it in seconds.

# Old machine
claude-backup export-config
# => ~/claude-config-2026-02-25.tar.gz (47 KB)

# Transfer via AirDrop, USB, email, etc.

# New machine
npx claude-backup import-config claude-config-2026-02-25.tar.gz

Plugins are not included in the export (they are re-downloaded on first launch). Only the plugin manifest in settings.json is backed up.

Backend Modes

Choose where your backups live:

# GitHub private repo (default if gh is installed)
npx claude-backup

# Local only — no remote, no GitHub needed
npx claude-backup --local

# Custom git remote
npx claude-backup --backend git
claude-backup backend set git --remote git@myserver:backups.git

Switch backends anytime — even after setup:

claude-backup backend set github   # switch to GitHub
claude-backup backend set local    # switch to local-only
claude-backup backend set git --remote <url>  # custom remote

Backups go to ~/.claude-backup/ as a local git repo. Everything works the same — sync, restore, peek, export/import.

Backup Schedule

Control how often backups run:

claude-backup schedule daily    # Every day at 3:00 AM (default)
claude-backup schedule 6h       # Every 6 hours
claude-backup schedule hourly   # Every hour
claude-backup schedule off      # Disable automatic backups

Restore Everything

Restore all sessions at once — useful for a fresh machine or disaster recovery:

claude-backup restore --all             # restore every session
claude-backup restore --all --force     # overwrite existing sessions

Claude Code Plugin

For the maintained agent skill shared with Codex, install it from Tomstack:

npx skills@latest add tombelieber/tomstack --skill=backup

Or install the whole managed Claude skill bundle:

claude plugin marketplace add tombelieber/tomstack
claude plugin install tomstack-skills@tomstack

Use this standalone product plugin when you specifically want its bundled CLI
with no npm install:

/plugin marketplace add tombelieber/claude-backup
/plugin install claude-backup@claude-backup

That's it. The plugin bundles the CLI — the agent runs it directly from the plugin cache. No global install, no npx, no PATH setup.

• Credentials are never backed up. .credentials.json and .encryption_key are hardcoded exclusions.
• GitHub repo is private by default.
• export-config warns if any file appears to contain sensitive content (tokens, secrets, passwords).
• import-config does not overwrite existing credentials.

~/.claude-backup/                         # Git repo -> private GitHub repo
├── manifest.json                         # Root manifest (aggregates all machines)
├── machines/
│   └── <machine-slug>/                   # Per-machine namespace
│       ├── manifest.json                 # Machine-specific metadata
│       ├── config/                       # Config profile
│       │   ├── settings.json
│       │   ├── settings.local.json
│       │   ├── CLAUDE.md
│       │   ├── agents/
│       │   ├── hooks/
│       │   ├── skills/
│       │   └── rules/
│       ├── session-index.json            # Auto-generated, gitignored
│       ├── projects/                     # Sessions (gzipped)
│       │   ├── -Users-foo-myproject/
│       │   │   ├── session-abc.jsonl.gz
│       │   │   └── sessions-index.json
│       │   └── ...
│       └── history.jsonl.gz             # Command history (gzipped)
└── ...                                   # Other machines

Sessions are namespaced by machine — backups from multiple devices stay organized and searchable. Existing v3.1 backups are auto-migrated on first sync.

• macOS (Linux coming soon)
• git
• gzip (built-in on macOS)
• python3 (built-in on macOS since Catalina)
• gh (GitHub CLI) — optional. Enables remote backup. Without it, backups are local-only.

claude-backup uninstall

Removes the daily scheduler and optionally deletes local backup data. Delete the GitHub repo separately:

gh repo delete claude-backup-data

Related

• claude-view — 10 Claude sessions running. What are they doing? npx claude-view

If claude-backup saves your sessions, consider giving it a star. It helps others discover this tool.

MIT