Refresh system prompt every request

System prompt flags in resumed conversations

By default, Claude Code builds the system prompt once, on a conversation's first request, with the text from any system prompt flags applied, and records it in the session. Until the conversation is compacted, every later request uses that recorded prompt, including after you return to the conversation with --resume or --continue. If you pass different system prompt flag text, or none, on that later launch, it takes effect once the conversation is compacted or when you start a new conversation.

Outside of cloud sessions, if you start Claude Code in bare mode by passing --bare or setting CLAUDE_CODE_SIMPLE=1, recording stays off unless you pass --system-prompt-snapshot on. Before v2.1.268, sessions that don't fetch feature flags, including sessions on Amazon Bedrock, Google Cloud's Agent Platform, and Microsoft Foundry, rebuilt the prompt on every request and --system-prompt-snapshot had no effect.

To rebuild the prompt on every request instead, for example while you iterate on its wording across --continue runs, pass --system-prompt-snapshot off. Before v2.1.265, passing any of the system prompt flags also turned recording off unless you passed --system-prompt-snapshot on.