Subagent Context Isolation - Claude Code
Prevent bloating the main conversation with research or exploration.
Context isolation is the defining feature of subagents. Work done inside a subagent stays there - only the summary comes back.
What it does
When you delegate to a subagent, its reads, tool output, and intermediate reasoning don't count against the main session's context. The main agent gets a condensed return value. This means a thousand-line exploration can resolve to a short answer without eating your window.
When to use it
- Any investigation that would otherwise clutter context.
- Large codebases where reading enough to answer a question costs a lot.
- Parallel fan-out with many independent branches.
- Keeping the main session focused on coding rather than scanning.
Gotchas
- Anything you need later has to make it into the subagent's return. If you lose it, you lose it.
- Subagent isolation isn't a security boundary - it's a context boundary.
- Over-delegating can fragment work. Some tasks want the main agent in-context.
Official docs: https://code.claude.com/docs/en/sub-agents.md
Technical content at the intersection of AI and development. Building with AI agents, Claude Code, and modern dev tools - then showing you exactly how it works.
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