What
Claude Code keeps a copy of your sign-in token (the saved credential that proves you are logged in) and checks whether the stored credentials have changed. That check has a new fallback.
- If the credentials look unchanged but the cached token is unusable, Claude Code rechecks it and reads the keychain again. The keychain is your system's secure password store.
- The recheck is rate-limited using a timestamp,
lastUnusableTokenRecheckAt. - Before, only a change in the credentials' version or file modification time triggered a reload.
- A variable mix-up in the version comparison was fixed.
- Without the keychain, the modification time of
.credentials.jsonis read differently. - A new experiment name,
auth_refresh_lock, was added to the list of known gates, andauto_mode_classifier_wordingwas removed. - One sign-in request now sends a user-agent header, which identifies the program making the request.
Why
If your token was refreshed elsewhere or stopped working, a running session has another chance to pick up working credentials without a restart.
Something disagreesSomething we can check disagrees with this entry, or the writer said they could not settle it.
The writer flagged doubt
An extra condition controls when the recheck runs, and it is not clear what it checks or how often the recheck helps in practice.