Claude Code has captured the imagination of the programming community like few tools before it, and its creator has some tips on how best to use the service.
Anthropic’s Boris Cherny, who had created Claude Code, has shared a list of tips on how to make the most of the tool. Cherny had created Claude Code as a side project while at Anthropic. Once it was released, it immediately went viral, and has is helping developers write their code ever more efficiently using AI.
“I wanted to quickly share a few tips for using Claude Code, sourced directly from the Claude Code team,” Cherny said on X. “The way the team uses Claude is different than how I use it. Remember: there is no one right way to use Claude Code — everyones’ setup is different. You should experiment to see what works for you!” he added.
Boris Cherny’s Claude Code Tips
1. Do more in parallel
Spin up 3–5 git worktrees at once, each running its own Claude session in parallel. It’s the single biggest productivity unlock, and the top tip from the team. Personally, I use multiple git checkouts, but most of the Claude Code team prefers worktrees — it’s the reason (Anthropic employee) Anthony Morris built native support for them into the Claude Desktop app! Some people also name their worktrees and set up shell aliases (za, zb, zc) so they can hop between them in one keystroke. Others have a dedicated “analysis” worktree that’s only for reading logs and running BigQuery.
2. Start every complex task in plan mode. Pour your energy into the plan so Claude can 1-shot the implementation. One person has one Claude write the plan, then they spin up a second Claude to review it as a staff engineer. Another says the moment something goes sideways, they switch back to plan mode and re-plan. Don’t keep pushing. They also explicitly tell Claude to enter plan mode for verification steps, not just for the build.
3. Invest in your CLAUDE.md. After every correction, end with: “Update your CLAUDE.md so you don’t make that mistake again.” Claude is eerily good at writing rules for itself. Ruthlessly edit your CLAUDE.md over time. Keep iterating until Claude’s mistake rate measurably drops. One engineer tells Claude to maintain a notes directory for every task/project, updated after every PR. They then point CLAUDE.md at it.
4. Create your own skills and commit them to git. Reuse across every project. Tips from the team:
– If you do something more than once a day, turn it into a skill or command
– Build a /techdebt slash command and run it at the end of every session to find and kill duplicated code
– Set up a slash command that syncs 7 days of Slack, GDrive, Asana, and GitHub into one context dump
– Build analytics-engineer-style agents that write dbt models, review code, and test changes in dev.
5. Claude fixes most bugs by itself. Here’s how we do it: Enable the Slack MCP, then paste a Slack bug thread into Claude and just say “fix.” Zero context switching required. Or, just say “Go fix the failing CI tests.” Don’t micromanage how. Point Claude at docker logs to troubleshoot distributed systems — it’s surprisingly capable at this.
6. Level up your prompting
a. Challenge Claude. Say “Grill me on these changes and don’t make a PR until I pass your test.” Make Claude be your reviewer. Or, say “Prove to me this works” and have Claude diff behavior between main and your feature branch
b. After a mediocre fix, say: “Knowing everything you know now, scrap this and implement the elegant solution”
c. Write detailed specs and reduce ambiguity before handing work off. The more specific you are, the better the output
7. Terminal & Environment Setup The team loves Ghostty! Multiple people like its synchronized rendering, 24-bit color, and proper unicode support. For easier Claude-juggling, use /statusline to customize your status bar to always show context usage and current git branch. Many of us also color-code and name our terminal tabs, sometimes using tmux — one tab per task/worktree. Use voice dictation. You speak 3x faster than you type, and your prompts get way more detailed as a result. (hit fn x2 on macOS).
8. Use subagents
a. Append “use subagents” to any request where you want Claude to throw more compute at the problem
b. Offload individual tasks to subagents to keep your main agent’s context window clean and focused
c. Route permission requests to Opus 4.5 via a hook — let it scan for attacks and auto-approve the safe ones
9. Use Claude for data & analytics Ask Claude Code to use the “bq” CLI to pull and analyze metrics on the fly. We have a BigQuery skill checked into the codebase, and everyone on the team uses it for anlytics queries directly in Claude Code. Personally, I haven’t written a line of SQL in 6+ months. This works for any database that has a CLI, MCP, or API.
10. Learning with Claude
A few tips from the team to use Claude Code for learning:
a. Enable the “Explanatory” or “Learning” output style in /config to have Claude explain the *why* behind its changes
b. Have Claude generate a visual HTML presentation explaining unfamiliar code. It makes surprisingly good slides!
c. Ask Claude to draw ASCII diagrams of new protocols and codebases to help you understand them
d. Build a spaced-repetition learning skill: you explain your understanding, Claude asks follow-ups to fill gaps, stores the result