Unclear Which feature this skip applies to is not stated, so the practical effect of setting the variable is unknown.
What
There is a new environment variable, CLAUDE_CODE_RETRY_WATCHDOG_MAX_WAIT_MS. An environment variable is a named setting you give a program when you start it, for example in your shell.
Claude Code has a check it skips when its retry watchdog (a timer that watches requests being tried again) is in use. That skip now only happens when CLAUDE_CODE_RETRY_WATCHDOG_MAX_WAIT_MS is not set. If you set it, the skip no longer happens.
Why
Setting this variable changes whether a feature runs that is otherwise skipped for some accounts and modes.
Names in the bundleCLAUDE_CODE_RETRY_WATCHDOG_MAX_WAIT_MS
Something disagreesSomething we can check disagrees with this entry, or the writer said they could not settle it.
The writer flagged doubt
Which feature this skip applies to is not stated, so the practical effect of setting the variable is unknown.
Anthropic's release notes agree
Added CLAUDE_CODE_RETRY_WATCHDOG_MAX_WAIT_MS to limit how long unattended retry mode (CLAUDE_CODE_RETRY_WATCHDOG) waits out 429 and 529…
The name it cites is new in this build
New in this build: CLAUDE_CODE_RETRY_WATCHDOG_MAX_WAIT_MS