Bug: Desktop app crash wiped all Claude Code session history (~/.claude recreated)

Summary

After the Claude desktop app crashed, all Claude Code (Code tab) sessions and projects disappeared from the sidebar. The ~/.claude directory was recreated from scratch on restart, and all previous session transcripts are gone.

Environment

• Claude desktop app (Microsoft Store / MSIX package), version 2.16120.0.0
• Bundled Claude Code: 2.1.284
• Windows 11 Home 10.0.26300
• Date: 2026-09-30, ~11:46 PM local time

Steps

1. Used the desktop app normally with several Claude Code sessions across multiple local project folders (sessions going back to at least July 2026).
2. The app crashed (Crashpad directory timestamp: 2026-09-30 11:46:39 PM).
3. Relaunched the app.

Expected

Previous Code-tab sessions and their transcripts still listed and resumable.

Actual

• The session sidebar is empty. list_sessions (including archived) returns no sessions other than the new one.
• Every item in %USERPROFILE%\.claude\ (projects, sessions, cache, backups, .credentials.json, .last-cleanup) has a creation time of 11:47:07–11:47:20 PM, right after the crash.
• %USERPROFILE%\.claude\projects\ contains only the new session's folder. All prior .jsonl transcripts are gone.
• In %USERPROFILE%\.claude.json, the projects map lists only the new scratch workspace. firstStartTime (2026-06-29) was kept, so the file was rewritten, not freshly created.
• %APPDATA%\Claude\claude-code-sessions\<org>\<account>\ contains only the new session's local_*.json.
• The deleted files are not in the Recycle Bin.
• Older Cowork data in %APPDATA%\Claude\local-agent-mode-sessions\ (July 2026) survived.
• The app's logs\ folder hasn't been written since 2026-08-20, so there are no logs from the crash.
• A Windows "Previous Versions" snapshot of %USERPROFILE%\.claude from about 22 hours before the crash doesn't seem to contain the session history either. The history may have disappeared before the crash, with the crash/restart only making it visible.

Impact

Months of local session history across several projects were permanently lost with no warning and no way to recover them.

Asks

• Find out what deletes or recreates ~/.claude on startup after a crash.
• Back up session transcripts, or delete them in a recoverable way, before any reset or cleanup.
• Check why desktop logging stopped after 2026-08-20.