VSCode extension ignores per-workspace auth when using CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR

[ithiria894]

Bug Description

When using CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR environment variable in VSCode workspace settings to separate Claude Code accounts across different workspaces, the VSCode extension does not respect the per-workspace auth and always uses the same account, even though the terminal CLI correctly uses the correct account.

Setup

• Two VSCode workspaces, each intended to use a different Claude account
• Workspace A (work): has .vscode/settings.json with:

  {
    "claudeCode.environmentVariables": [
      {
        "name": "CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR",
        "value": "/home/user/.claude-work"
      }
    ]
  }

• Workspace B (personal): uses default ~/.claude/ config dir

Expected Behavior

• Workspace A extension → uses work account (e.g. work@company.com)
• Workspace B extension → uses personal account (e.g. personal@gmail.com)

Actual Behavior

• Terminal claude auth status correctly shows different accounts per workspace ✅
• VSCode extension shows the wrong account for one workspace, and /usage reports identical usage numbers (40% / 1%) for both ❌
• Verified on claude.ai website: personal account shows 0% usage, confirming the extension was routing all API calls through the work account despite displaying the personal account name
• The extension's Account & Usage panel displays the personal account info (email, org name), but the underlying API calls go through the work account's token

Steps to Reproduce

1. Set up two VSCode workspaces with different Claude accounts using CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR
2. claude auth login in each workspace's terminal — confirm different accounts via claude auth status
3. Open Claude Code via the VSCode extension in both workspaces
4. Compare /usage output — both show identical numbers
5. Verify on claude.ai website — only one account has actual usage

Environment

• Claude Code v2.1.76
• VSCode on Linux (Ubuntu)
• Both accounts on Claude Team plan
• Auth method: claude.ai OAuth

Impact

• Users who set up multi-account separation believe their personal usage is on their personal account, but it's actually being billed to their work account
• The extension UI displays misleading account information, showing one account while using another's credentials

[yurukusa]

This is likely because the VSCode extension resolves the config directory at startup time (when the extension host initializes), not per-workspace. The claudeCode.environmentVariables setting in .vscode/settings.json sets env vars for the terminal process spawned by the extension, but the extension's own account resolution may use a different code path that reads from the default ~/.claude/ before the workspace-level env var is applied.

A few things to try as workarounds:

1. User-level settings.json for the "non-default" workspace — instead of workspace settings, try setting CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR in your shell profile (~/.bashrc or ~/.zshrc) conditionally based on the current directory, so it's already set when VSCode launches.

2. Launch VSCode with the env var pre-set for the work workspace:

   CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR=/home/user/.claude-work code /path/to/work-workspace

   This ensures the env var is available to the extension host process from the start, not just the integrated terminal.

3. Check if CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR is visible to the extension host by running in the VSCode dev console (Help > Toggle Developer Tools):

   process.env.CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR

   If this returns undefined, the extension host never received the env var — confirming the workspace-level environmentVariables setting only applies to spawned terminal processes.

The root cause is likely that the extension reads auth tokens during its own initialization (in the extension host process), which runs before workspace-scoped env vars are injected into child processes. Filing this as a feature request for the extension to explicitly read CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR from workspace settings during auth resolution would be the proper fix.

[ithiria894]

I tried the workaround of launching VSCode with the env var pre-set (CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR=/home/nicole/.claude-work code /path/to/workspace), but it didn't work reliably. Even after fully killing all VSCode processes and relaunching with the env var set, the extension still used the wrong account.

Could the Anthropic team provide an official solution for multi-account setups? A common use case is having separate work and personal Claude accounts across different workspaces. The current claudeCode.environmentVariables workspace setting is misleading because it appears to configure per-workspace auth, but doesn't actually affect the extension's credential resolution.

An ideal fix would be for the extension to explicitly read CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR from workspace settings (.vscode/settings.json) during auth initialization, rather than relying solely on the process environment at extension host startup.

[yurukusa]

Thanks for testing that — confirms the extension resolves credentials independently of the process env vars, so even pre-setting CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR before launch doesn't reliably propagate to the auth path.

Agreed this needs an upstream fix. The ideal behavior would be the extension reading CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR from workspace settings during its own auth initialization, as you described. Until then there isn't a clean workaround on the user side.

You might want to file a separate feature request specifically for multi-account/multi-workspace support so the team can track it — this issue's title is about something else and multi-account is a distinct use case that others would benefit from finding.