What Remote Control Is
Remote Control lets you pick up a Claude Code session that was running on your laptop from your phone, a tablet, or a browser on another computer and keep directing it. Work you started at your desk can continue on the couch from your phone, or from a browser on a different computer.
The most important point is that the session runs on your own computer from start to finish. Code execution and file access happen only on your device; your phone and browser are merely windows for looking into that session and sending it messages.
That means your local environment stays fully alive even from afar. Your filesystem, the MCP servers you have attached, your tools, and your project settings are all preserved, and typing @ on your phone or browser autocompletes the file paths in your project.
It Is Not the Cloud — How It Differs From Claude Code on the web
Claude Code also has a separate, similar-looking feature called Claude Code on the web. Both use the claude.ai/code screen, but the decisive difference is where the session runs.
With Remote Control the session runs on your own computer, so it uses your local MCP, tools, and project settings as-is. Claude Code on the web, by contrast, runs on cloud infrastructure managed by Anthropic.
If you are in the middle of local work and want to continue it on another device, use Remote Control; if you want to kick off work with no local setup, work in a repo you have not cloned, or run several tasks in parallel, use Claude Code on the web.
| Remote Control | Claude Code on the web | |
|---|---|---|
| Where the session runs | Your own computer (CLI / VS Code) | Anthropic cloud |
| Local files, MCP, settings | Used as-is | Not used |
| When to use it | Continue in-progress local work on another device | Start work with no local setup / run in parallel |
Three Ways to Start
You turn Remote Control on from the CLI or the VS Code extension. The CLI offers three approaches.
First, server mode. Run claude remote-control in your project folder and the process stays up in the terminal, waiting for remote connections. It shows a session URL, and pressing the space bar brings up a QR code. A single process can run several sessions at once.
Second, an interactive session. Start with claude --remote-control (or --rc) and you can type directly in the terminal as usual while also controlling that same session remotely.
Third, if you are already in a session, type /remote-control (or /rc) inside it and your conversation so far carries over into a remote session.
In the VS Code extension, type /remote-control or /rc in the prompt box.
claude remote-controlclaude --remote-control/remote-controlConnecting From Your Phone
Once a session is up, you can join it from another device in a few ways. Open the session URL in any browser and you go straight to that session on claude.ai/code.
The fastest route is the QR code. In claude remote-control (server mode), turn the QR code on with the space bar, and scanning it with your phone opens that session right away in the Claude app (iOS / Android).
Alternatively, open claude.ai/code or the Claude app and find the session by name in the session list. In the mobile app, go to the Code tab in the bottom navigation to see the session list, where an online Remote Control session has a green dot on its computer icon.
If you do not have the Claude app yet, type /mobile inside Claude Code to bring up a QR code for the iOS / Android download.
How You Use It — Examples
Monitoring while out: set a long-running task going at your desk, head out, and check its progress and send messages from your phone on the couch or on the move.
Using several devices at once: terminal, browser, and phone all connect to the same session, and the conversation and the progress of subagents and workflows sync in real time. You can take turns talking to it from any device.
Sending files and images: files and images you attach on your phone or browser are downloaded by Claude Code to your computer and handed to the session as @ file references. A caption is optional.
Push notifications: with Remote Control on, you get a push notification on your phone when a long task finishes or a decision is needed. You can also ask directly in the prompt, like “let me know when the tests are done.” You configure this in /config by turning on ‘Push when Claude decides’ and ‘Push when actions required.’
Recovery after a drop: even if your laptop sleeps or the network drops, the session automatically reconnects once your computer comes back. While the connection is being restored, status updates from subagents and workflows are queued and delivered once it recovers.
Requirements and Limits
Subscription: it works on the Pro, Max, Team, and Enterprise plans. It does not work with an API key. On Team and Enterprise it is off by default, so an organization Owner has to turn the Remote Control toggle on first in the Claude Code admin settings.
Authentication: run claude and log in to your claude.ai account with /login.
Environments where it does not work: it does not work on Amazon Bedrock, Google Cloud Agent Platform, or Microsoft Foundry, and it is also disabled when ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL points to a host other than api.anthropic.com (an LLM gateway or proxy).
Keeping the local process alive is required: Remote Control runs as a local process. If you close the terminal, quit VS Code, or stop the claude process, the session ends too.
Offline timeout: even with your computer on, if it cannot reach the network for about 10 minutes or more, the session expires and the process shuts down. Start again fresh with claude remote-control.
Some commands are terminal-only: commands like /plugin and /resume work only in the local CLI.
Status: as of July 2026 it is a research preview. The feature is still being refined.
What About Security
Your local session only makes outbound HTTPS requests and does not open any inbound ports on your computer. Turning Remote Control on registers with the Anthropic API and polls for work to do.
All traffic goes through the Anthropic API over TLS (port 443). The connection uses several short-lived credentials split by purpose, each expiring separately.
While Remote Control is connected, the session record (your messages, Claude's responses, tool activity) is stored on Anthropic's servers. This is to sync the conversation across devices and to reconnect after the network drops. Execution and file access, however, stay only on your computer.
To turn it off entirely, use the disableRemoteControl setting. Organizations with compliance requirements such as Zero Data Retention cannot turn Remote Control on.
Team and Enterprise have Trusted Devices (in beta). It is an organization setting that requires a device to be registered and logged in within the past 18 hours before it can view or operate a Remote Control session, confirmed with Face ID, Touch ID, Windows Hello, or a passkey. Biometric data is processed only on the device and is not stored by Anthropic.
Why It Matters Now — the Unit of Delegation Is Changing
The real message Remote Control sends is not developer convenience. It is a signal that handing a long-running job to AI and then stepping away is becoming the norm.
Beyond Remote Control, Claude Code has several ways to work while you are away from your seat: Dispatch, which throws a task from your phone; Channels, which react to external events like Telegram or Discord; and Scheduled tasks, which run at set times. Remote Control is the one for continuing to steer an in-progress local session from another device.
From SH Consulting's point of view, this is the moment the unit of delegation changes. Where work used to require a person watching the screen, now productivity turns on how well you design flows that do not need a person watching. The more a team gets used to this way of working, the less time they have to stay glued to the screen, stepping in only at the moments that call for judgment.