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Cloud sessions are available on Pro, Max, and Team plans, and for Enterprise users with premium seats or Chat + Claude Code seats.
A cloud session runs Claude Code on cloud infrastructure instead of your machine, Anthropic-managed by default. This quickstart starts one from claude.ai/code in your browser. You can also start one from the Claude mobile app, the Desktop app, or your terminal with claude --cloud. You’ll need a GitHub repository to get started. Claude clones it into an isolated virtual machine, makes changes, and pushes a branch for you to review. Sessions persist across devices, so a task you start on your laptop is ready to review from your phone later. Each session counts toward your plan’s usage limits alongside the rest of your Claude and Claude Code usage, and there’s no separate charge for the cloud VM. Cloud sessions work well for:
  • Parallel tasks: run several independent tasks at once, each in its own session and branch, without managing multiple worktrees
  • Repos you don’t have locally: Claude clones the repo fresh every session, so you don’t need it checked out
  • Tasks that don’t need frequent steering: submit a well-defined task, do something else, and review the result when Claude is done
  • Code questions and exploration: understand a codebase or trace how a feature is implemented without a local checkout
For work that needs your local config, tools, or environment, running Claude Code locally or using Remote Control is a better fit.

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How sessions run

The steps below describe Anthropic-hosted sessions. In a self-hosted environment, the clone and everything after it run on your organization’s own runners, where network boundaries, setup, and push behavior are operator-configured. When you submit a task:
  1. Clone and prepare: your repository is cloned to an Anthropic-managed VM, and your setup script runs if configured.
  2. Configure network: internet access is set based on your environment’s access level.
  3. Work: Claude analyzes code, makes changes, runs tests, and checks its work. You can watch and steer throughout, or step away and come back when it’s done.
  4. Push the branch: when Claude reaches a stopping point, it pushes its branch to GitHub. You review the diff, leave inline comments, create a PR, or send another message to keep going.
The session doesn’t close when the branch is pushed. PR creation and further edits all happen within the same conversation.

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Compare ways to run Claude Code

Claude Code behaves the same everywhere. What changes is where the session runs and whether your local configuration is available: