Agent history · Claude Cowork · checked
Where is my Claude Cowork history, and how long does it last?
Cowork keeps a task's history where the task ran. A task on your computer writes an audit.jsonl file to the Claude app's local-agent-mode-sessions folder, outside Anthropic's retention, and people have lost that history when a plan lapsed or an app update moved it. Since 6 Oct 2026, new Cowork tasks on Pro and Max run in Anthropic's cloud and are saved to your Claude account instead. Keep a copy of the local folder. agentreceipt reads it on your computer.
Changed recently: Since 6 Oct 2026, new Cowork tasks on Pro and Max run in Anthropic's cloud and the "Only on your computer" setting is gone; tasks already started on your computer stay there until they finish.[4]
Where your Claude Cowork history lives
- macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/local-agent-mode-sessions/…/audit.jsonl, one folder per task[1]
- Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\local-agent-mode-sessions\…\audit.jsonl[1]
- Windows, Microsoft Store app: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Packages\Claude_*\LocalCache\Roaming\Claude\local-agent-mode-sessions[3]
- Claude Desktop in third-party mode: the same folder under Claude-3p. Anthropic documents the file there as an append-only, chained log of tool calls, permission decisions and file operations, beside the task's uploads/ and outputs/.[2]
- Cloud tasks (Pro and Max, from 6 Oct 2026): in your Claude account.[4]
- Team and Enterprise: a local task's history stays on the member's computer, where admins cannot manage or delete it; Cowork sessions are in the Compliance API.[5]
How long it lasts
| What | How long |
|---|---|
| A task on your computer | until it is deleted; outside Anthropic's retention[5] |
| Third-party mode | until deleted, unless the admin sets coworkSessionRetentionDays (1 to 3,650 days)[2] |
| A deleted cloud task | removed from Anthropic's systems within 30 days[6] |
| Plan ends | history reported unreachable (claude-code#62893, closed without a fix)[7] |
| A renewal fails | 7 days of history reported lost (claude-code#79618)[3] |
| Overnight, on macOS | history reported lost (claude-code#45076)[8] |
| A Windows app update | sessions reported not carried over to the new version (claude-code#38055)[9] |
| A long task is compacted | the app stops showing older turns; the file on disk keeps them[10] |
How to keep a copy
- Copy the whole local-agent-mode-sessions folder (above) to somewhere you back up; each task's uploads/ and outputs/ come with it.[2]
- Do it before a plan ends or lapses, and again each week.[7]
- Team and Enterprise admins: send Cowork's events (prompts, tool decisions, results and cost) to your own OpenTelemetry collector from Admin settings › Cowork; it starts with new sessions.[11]
- Cloud tasks: Team and Enterprise reach them through the Compliance API; no export for one person is documented.[5]
Copy every local Cowork task on a Mac, with today's date in the folder name:
$ cp -R "$HOME/Library/Application Support/Claude/local-agent-mode-sessions" ~/Documents/cowork-history-$(date +%F)
On Windows, in PowerShell:
$ Copy-Item -Recurse "$env:APPDATA\Claude\local-agent-mode-sessions" "$HOME\Documents\cowork-history-$(Get-Date -Format yyyy-MM-dd)"
Then read what Cowork did this week, on the same computer:
$ npx --allow-git=root github:agentwares/agentreceipt
agentreceipt reads every audit.jsonl in those folders: each tool Cowork called, by name (sends, writes, deletes), your answers to its permission prompts, the results that came back as errors, and tokens priced at API list price. Anthropic does not document the file's format (claude-code#27724, closed as not planned), so agentreceipt reads the shapes others have mapped from it. Cloud tasks are not on your computer to read.
npx --allow-git=root github:agentwares/agentreceipt reads Claude Cowork's audit.jsonl files, Claude Code and Codex session logs, and any Zapier, Make or n8n export you name, on your computer, and prints the week by folder or project: sends, writes, deletes, approvals, failures, tokens and cost. A field a log does not hold reads "not recorded". No account, no network request, no LLM; it sends nothing. --pdf receipt.pdf writes a local, unsigned copy. Free and MIT licensed.
Keep a signed record that survives a downgrade or a shutdown — Solo $19/mo, Team $99/mo, or $29 once at a shutdown.
Not built yet. It would keep a copy of what your agents did outside the vendor, signed so a client or a boss can check it was not edited, and still there after a plan ends or a vendor closes: names, times and counts, never the text of your messages or files. If you would pay for it, say so with one click. The click is counted; nothing else is sent or stored.
I would pay for a signed recordSources
Each vendor's own pages, read on 9 Oct 2026. Vendors change these; the date each says it was updated is shown where it shows one.
- claude-code#27724: the audit.jsonl session format has no public documentation
- Claude Desktop (third-party mode): data storage
- claude-code#79618: a failed renewal lost 7 days of Cowork history
- Claude Help: Use Claude Cowork on web, desktop and mobile
- Claude Help: Cowork for Team and Enterprise plans
- Claude Help: Getting started with Cowork
- claude-code#62893: Cowork history unreachable after the subscription ends
- claude-code#45076: Cowork history lost overnight on macOS
- claude-code#38055: a Windows update did not carry Cowork sessions over
- claude-code#37273: compaction hides earlier turns
- Claude docs: Monitor Cowork with OpenTelemetry
agentreceipt is a free tool from agentwares. Source: github.com/agentwares/agentreceipt.