installationPreference
A Claude Code settings key, read out of the shipped bundle. No mined inventory carries it: everything below comes from what this site has written about it.
Plugin resolution now distinguishes sync-attributed plugins and enforces managed hooks-only rules.
Not Anthropic's. This is the line from the earliest changelog entry here that named it, v2.1.261.
In the changelogs
6Releases whose published page names installationPreference.
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v2.1.304
Plugin sync installs required plugins before optional ones
Plugin sync now downloads plugins marked as required before other new plugins, and handles plugins renamed on the server
found in this entry's text
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v2.1.281
Admin marketplace allowlist: installationPreference is clamped without a pin
Admin-allowed plugin marketplaces must be pinned to a fixed version to use an installation preference other than "available"
found in this entry's text, named in this entry
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v2.1.277
New marketplace field presentsAs surfaced from plugin metadata
Plugin marketplace metadata now includes a presentsAs field
found in this entry's text
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v2.1.268
New 'required' plugin installation preference can force a plugin to stay enabled
Plugins can now be marked 'required' so they stay enabled regardless of user or admin settings
found in this entry's text, named in this entry
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v2.1.268
Org-required plugins can no longer be disabled/uninstalled, with new structured failure codes
Plugins your organization requires can no longer be disabled or uninstalled, and failures now report a specific reason code
found in this entry's text, named in this entry
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v2.1.261
Plugin loading gains 'sync-attributed' directories and managed-hooks-only enforcement
Plugin resolution now distinguishes sync-attributed plugins and enforces managed hooks-only rules.
found in this entry's text
First cited
1The earliest release whose published evidence quoted installationPreference was v2.1.304, 19 Oct 2026. That is the oldest release this project wrote about it, so it is a floor on the name's age and not the release that introduced it. It is not a presence reading: which builds carried the name is the table below.
Presence across releases
0The miner has never read a build containing this name. It is here because a changelog entry of ours names it, which is evidence that it existed and not evidence of which releases carried it. The inventory starts at v2.1.138 and everything older than that was never mined.
Read out of the published npm bundle release by release, and out of Anthropic's own documentation as this site captured it. Nothing on this page is a description anybody here wrote about what the settings key does. All settings keys.