Claude Desktop: hidden debug data consumes macOS disk space

Hi,

A quick note about reclaiming massive HD space if you have Claude Desktop installed on macOS.

Writing this mainly as a note to myself, but thought it could help others too.

After installing Claude Desktop on my Mac, the system was getting sluggish. I discovered Claude Desktop was creating a hidden folder with an insane amount of debug data - 472GB in my case!

How did it find the missing amount of diskspace?:

1. I compared my home folder size (730GB) to the visible folders in my home folder (140GB) - so 590GB was missing!

2. Checked hidden files and found ~/.claude/debug contained the culprit

3. I used OnyX to browse hidden files and get size info

How was it fixed:

Close Claude Desktop first, then run:

rm -rf ~/.claude/debug

Note that this command took about 20 minutes for me to finish!!! and it reclaimed nearly half my HD space!

Now you can also prevent this from happening:

• Add this to your ~/.zshrc file:

export CLAUDE_CODE_DISABLE_NONESSENTIAL_TRAFFIC=true

• Then run: source ~/.zshrc

Hope this helps someone!

Joris