Context Control shows you the full context window Claude Code is about to send, as an interactive bar chart in the editor. Trim useless sections, edit or delete message parts, and optionally hold requests for your approval before they go to Anthropic—so you spend fewer tokens and keep context quality under control.
Context Control: Open Panel (Command Palette) — starts the proxy on 127.0.0.1:8080 by default (Context Control: Auto start proxy).
Set ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL to http://127.0.0.1:8080 for the environment where Claude Code runs (shell profile, terminal env in your IDE, etc.).
Features
Visualize the context window as sections (system, tools, user, assistant, tool I/O, etc.) with token and cost estimates.
Select and remove sections you do not want to send; edit text in an editor when you need to rewrite instead of delete.
Choose how requests are sent (e.g. auto vs ask permission) using the mode controls in the panel, depending on your proxy settings.
Stream the same traffic your tools expect: the proxy keeps SSE streaming end-to-end for the main message path.
Commands
Command
What it does
Context Control: Open Panel
Opens the Context Control view beside your editor.
Context Control: Restart Backend Proxy
Stops and restarts the local proxy (for example after changing port or Python).
Context Control: Retry Python Setup
Clears the bootstrap cache and re-runs Python discovery, venv creation, and dependency install. Use this if the initial setup failed or you changed your Python installation.
Settings
Search for Context Control in Settings (Ctrl+, / Cmd+,).
Setting
What it does
Context Control: Proxy port
Port the local proxy listens on (default 8080).
Context Control: Auto start proxy
Start the proxy when the panel opens (on by default).
Context Control: Python path
Full path to a Python 3.10+ executable. When set, the extension uses that interpreter directly for the proxy — no managed venv is created and you are responsible for having the backend dependencies installed in that environment. Leave empty (the default) to let the extension manage a dedicated virtual environment automatically.
Context Control: Backend directory
Advanced: folder that contains main.py. Usually left empty so the extension uses the bundled backend or a backend folder in an open workspace.
Context Control: Webview dist directory
Advanced: custom path to the built web UI. Usually left empty.
