CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_THREAD_ASK_OWN_WORK

Updated November 2, 2026 by Alex Sorokoletov

CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_THREAD_ASK_OWN_WORK is a Claude Code environment variable: In the held compact auto mode, a truthy value selects the 'own work' held state instead of the plain held state; the default comes from a server-side setting. Added between v2.1.315 and v2.1.317 and still present in v2.1.317. It is not in the official reference.

How to set it

For one session, export it in the shell that starts Claude Code:

export CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_THREAD_ASK_OWN_WORK=<value>
claude

To apply it to every session, add it to the env object of a settings file:

// ~/.claude/settings.json
{
  "env": {
    "CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_THREAD_ASK_OWN_WORK": "<value>"
  }
}

Related variables

• CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_THREAD_ASK_HELD
• CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_CLASSIFY_ASK_USER_QUESTION
• CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_CANDIDATE_WORDING: Chose the auto-mode classifier wording; a truthy value requested the 'candidate' variant and a falsy one the 'baseline'.
• CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_CLASSIFY_EDITS: Turns the classification pass on: every edit runs through the classifier before it touches disk.
• CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_EDIT_REMOVAL: Governs whether Auto mode may delete content as part of an edit.
• CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_EDIT_REMOVAL_CAP: Caps how much a single autonomous edit can remove before it's held for a human.
• CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_EMAIL_SENDER_REPLY_TURN: When true, enables the auto-mode email sender reply-turn rule and includes its reply-handling guidance in the prompt.
• CLAUDE_CODE_AUTO_MODE_EMAIL_SENDER_TURN: Set to true to force the email-sender-turn guidance (the rule against sending sensitive content to recipients outside the trust boundary) even when no message is marked as an email sender turn.

Frequently asked questions

All variables, searchable: Claude Code environment variables.