Two new settings.json fields control how much command output Claude sees inline: bashOutputMaxChars (default 30000, clamped 4000-128000) for Bash/PowerShell, and taskOutputMaxChars (default 32000, clamped 4000-128000) for the TaskOutput tool. Output beyond the limit is saved to a file with a preview and path shown instead. Setting these also replaces the older BASH_MAX_OUTPUT_LENGTH and TASK_MAX_OUTPUT_LENGTH env vars for this purpose.
Names in the bundlebashOutputMaxCharstaskOutputMaxChars
The entry above is what we published on the day. These lines were added later, as Anthropic's own pages caught up, and they sit beside the original rather than replacing it.
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Anthropic's documentation has since written up bashOutputMaxChars, on All settings.
| [`bashOutputMaxChars`](#bashoutputmaxchars) | Set how much of a successful command's [output](/docs/en/tools-reference#output-limits) Claude receives inline | Memory and context | Any file |settings-reference see the edit
Confirmed since
Anthropic's documentation has since written up taskOutputMaxChars, on Claude Code changelog.
* Removed the deprecated TaskOutput tool; Claude reads a background task's output file with Read instead, and the `taskOutputMaxChars` setting and `TASK_MAX_OUTPUT_LENGTH` no longer have any effectchangelog see the edit
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Anthropic's documentation agrees
Anthropic's documentation has since written up taskOutputMaxChars, on Claude Code changelog.
Anthropic's release notes agree
Added bashOutputMaxChars and taskOutputMaxChars settings to raise how much command and background-task output Claude receives inline before…
The name it cites is new in this build
New in this build: bashOutputMaxChars