You'll noticeTier: how much it should matter to you
3Useful: my rating, 1 to 5
2Signal: worth watching, 1 to 5
Terminal RenderingArea: what it touches
ImprovementsKind: in v2.1.277,
ImprovementsSection of the release
What
Claude Code's terminal image support (the kitty graphics protocol) gained two related improvements:
Images can now be sent to kitty-graphics-capable terminals via a file path or shared-memory name (t=f), instead of only as inline base64-encoded byte payloads.
A new active probe checks whether the terminal can actually read locally-written image files: it writes a small temp file, sends a file-based image request, and checks the terminal's reply, logging 'Terminal image files: yes/no' with the reason, rather than just assuming support.
A new request can query the terminal's cell size in pixels.
If the probe says no or is inconclusive, Claude Code falls back to the older inline byte transmission method.
Why
File-based transfer is more efficient than sending image bytes inline, but not all terminals support reading local files this way, so actively probing for support avoids broken images and picks the best method automatically.
