Intermediate8 min
Conversation Management Commands — The Full Reference
A complete reference for every conversation management command in Claude Code — from /clear and /compact to /insights and /team-onboarding, including the April 2026 additions.
Quick Reference
- →/clear: full context reset — cheapest fresh start, loses everything
- →/compact [focus]: summarize and continue — keeps direction, reduces tokens
- →/branch: fork without destroying the current thread
- →/context: real-time context window usage with actionable suggestions
- →/recap: structured summary of current session state (v2.1.108)
- →/insights: personalized workflow suggestions from 30-day history (March 2026)
- →/team-onboarding: generates a teammate ramp-up guide from your config and usage
Context Management Commands
| Command | What it does | When to use |
|---|---|---|
| /clear (or /new) | Resets conversation context completely. Keeps you in the same session but starts fresh. | When the current context is corrupted, off-track, or you want a clean start on a new task |
| /compact [focus] | Summarizes conversation history with optional focus directive. Reduces token count, preserves direction. | When context fills and you want to continue the same task without paying for the full history |
| /branch (or /fork) | Forks the conversation — original stays untouched, you work on the fork. | When exploring an alternative approach you might abandon |
| /context | Shows real-time context window usage breakdown with actionable suggestions. | When you want to understand what is consuming context before it fills |
| /cost | Shows token spend this session with per-model breakdown and cache hit analysis. | When you want to see how expensive the session has been |
/compact with a focus directive
Run '/compact focus on the payment integration decisions we made' to compress the history while explicitly preserving the most important parts. Without a focus directive, /compact summarizes everything equally — which may discard context you still need.