context-bar

context-bar keeps your Claude Code context window on screen as one stacked bar above the prompt, a color per category, with the tokens each one takes. It tells you what is filling the window without running /context, and it costs no tokens.

What it does

• A header with the tokens in use against the window size, where auto-compaction runs, and a percentage badge. The badge turns yellow at 70% of the way to compaction and red at 90%.
• The bar splits the window into the categories /context lists, such as system prompt, system tools, MCP tools, memory files, skills and messages. Messages, the slice that grows, is drawn in the accent orange. Free space is a thin line and the autocompact buffer is shaded.
• A legend under the bar gives each category’s tokens and its share of the window.
• It refreshes after each of your turns and after a /compact. Subagent turns are ignored, because they fill their own window.

For the same categories in a pane, next to usage limits and tool counts, see session-meter.

Install

Needs Claude Code 2.1.287 or later.

claude plugin marketplace add hamzafer/claude-code-mods
claude plugin install context-bar@claude-code-mods

Other repos use the same marketplace name, among them arasovic/claude-code-mods and karanb192/claude-code-mods. If claude plugin marketplace list already shows a claude-code-mods, the add clashes with it: run claude plugin marketplace remove claude-code-mods first.

Restart Claude Code. The bar shows on its own. /context-bar hides it or brings it back, and the choice is kept across sessions.

How it works

The numbers come from Claude Code’s own /context breakdown, which the engine estimates locally without token-count calls, so the bar sends nothing anywhere. The only thing the mod saves is whether you hid the bar, as one value in its plugin store.