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claude-code - 💡(How to fix) Fix Excessive token consumption on Opus 4.6 — thinking tokens disproportionate to output [4 comments, 2 participants]

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anthropics/claude-code#45333•Fetched 2026-04-09 08:07:47
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Simple tasks (3 v8 ignore annotations + ~20 unit tests = 3 commits) consumed 55% → 89% of a 5-hour session quota on Claude Code with Opus 4.6 (1M context).

Root Cause

Simple tasks (3 v8 ignore annotations + ~20 unit tests = 3 commits) consumed 55% → 89% of a 5-hour session quota on Claude Code with Opus 4.6 (1M context).

Code Example

"Churned for 3m 46s" → produced: nothing (waiting for user input)
"Crunched for 1m 39s" → produced: "Commit efcf14f2. D'autres fichiers à couvrir ?"
"Churned for 37s" → produced: 3 lines of text
Agent Sonnet: 56 tool uses for branch coverage tests → interrupted by user
RAW_BUFFERClick to expand / collapse

Summary

Simple tasks (3 v8 ignore annotations + ~20 unit tests = 3 commits) consumed 55% → 89% of a 5-hour session quota on Claude Code with Opus 4.6 (1M context).

Evidence from transcript

"Churned for 3m 46s" → produced: nothing (waiting for user input)
"Crunched for 1m 39s" → produced: "Commit efcf14f2. D'autres fichiers à couvrir ?"
"Churned for 37s" → produced: 3 lines of text
Agent Sonnet: 56 tool uses for branch coverage tests → interrupted by user

Quota impact

  • Before: 55% session quota used
  • After (~20 min of work): 89% session quota used
  • Context window: 58% filled, 38h58m accumulated session time
  • Paid overage: 44.62€ / 45€ limit (99% consumed)

Screenshots

(See attached — Settings > Usage page showing 72% then 89% shortly after)

Usage 72% Usage 89%

Note: Screenshots will be added in a follow-up comment as GitHub CLI does not support image uploads.

Questions

  1. Is it expected that "thinking tokens" (churning/crunching) consume quota even when no output is produced?
  2. Does cost scale non-linearly with context size (38h of conversation)?
  3. When a Sonnet sub-agent makes 56 tool calls, does each tool call also cost Opus tokens on the parent?

Environment

  • Claude Code CLI (latest)
  • Model: Opus 4.6 (1M context)
  • Plan: Max with paid overage enabled
  • OS: macOS Darwin 24.6.0

extent analysis

TL;DR

Review and optimize the usage of "thinking tokens" and tool calls in Claude Code to reduce quota consumption.

Guidance

  • Investigate if the "thinking tokens" (churning/crunching) are necessary for the tasks and if there are any optimization options available to reduce their usage.
  • Verify the cost scaling with context size to understand if the 38h of conversation is contributing to the high quota consumption.
  • Check the documentation or contact support to clarify if each tool call made by a Sonnet sub-agent also costs Opus tokens on the parent.

Example

No specific code snippet is provided as the issue is related to the usage and configuration of Claude Code and Opus 4.6.

Notes

The provided information suggests that the quota consumption is high due to the "thinking tokens" and tool calls, but more investigation is needed to understand the root cause and optimize the usage.

Recommendation

Apply workaround: Review and optimize the usage of "thinking tokens" and tool calls to reduce quota consumption, as the current usage pattern is leading to high quota consumption and paid overage.

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