effort-cycle: effort level keyboard shortcuts for Claude Code

A Claude Code plugin that changes the reasoning effort level from the keyboard, without leaving a row in the transcript:

• Alt+E steps the effort up: low → medium → high → xhigh → max, stopping at max.
• Alt+Shift+E steps it down, stopping at low.
• The footer shows the model and level as they change, as a meter colored cool to hot (gray, green, yellow, orange, red, by theme color), the blocks a press fills or empties lit for a moment: Opus 5.5 ▰▰▰▱▱ high. A press past either end lights the level's word. At max the model name turns red too, and while Claude works a light sweeps across the bar.

The level applies to the main thread's model requests. Subagents keep Claude Code's own level. Changing effort Claude Code's way (/effort, the Alt+P picker) takes over again from the next request.

What it hooks: each model request on the main thread, to set its effort level; the /effort and /model commands, which it lets run unchanged and only watches afterwards to drop its own level and redraw the footer; and the footer itself, to draw the meter. It reads your settings and nothing else, sends nothing anywhere, and keeps its state in the session only.

Mods (plugins of function hooks) are an early-access Claude Code API that changes between releases. This one is built and tested against Claude Code 2.1.283.

Install

1. Install it from the anerco marketplace, in Claude Code:

   /plugin marketplace add Anerco/plugins
   /plugin install effort-cycle@anerco
   

   Or, to work on it, clone the repo and load the folder with claude --plugin-dir <folder>, or in every session through CLAUDE_CODE_PLUGIN_DIRS in the env block of ~/.claude/settings.json.

2. Bind the keys in ~/.claude/keybindings.json:

   {
     "bindings": [
       { "context": "Global", "bindings": { "meta+e": "strip:jump9", "meta+shift+e": "strip:jump8" } }
     ]
   }

   A mod cannot own a key. It can only borrow one of Claude Code's own keybinding actions, so the mod listens for strip:jump9 (up) and strip:jump8 (down). Any modified key or chord works; a bare letter does not.

   On macOS, Option+E types an accent unless the terminal sends Option as Meta: in Terminal.app turn on Use Option as Meta key (Settings → Profiles → Keyboard), in iTerm2 set Left Option key to Esc+ (Settings → Profiles → Keys), in Ghostty set macos-option-as-alt = true. Or bind a ctrl chord instead.

Settings

/config lists five toggles, Effort keys: include low through include max, all on by default. The keys step only through the levels that are on, for every model. The values are stored in ~/.claude/settings.json under pluginConfigs, under the plugin's key (effort-cycle@anerco when installed from the marketplace).

Known issues

• The spinner can show a different level from the footer (#1). The footer is the level the requests go out with; the spinner reads Claude Code's own state, which a mod cannot change.
• The level is not kept after a restart. An Alt+E pick lasts for the session. A mod cannot write settings, so it cannot save the level the way the Alt+P picker does.
• Ultracode is not a step. It is a separate on/off switch that works at any level (/effort ultracode on), and the plugin API exposes no way to switch it.

Develop

claude plugin validate .
claude plugin test .

Run /plugin-types .claude-plugin/types in a Claude Code session to write the API declarations an editor and tsc type the mod against. They are generated per Claude Code build and are not committed.

Privacy

effort-cycle collects no personal data. It reads Claude Code's own settings and the session's model name, keeps the chosen effort level in session state on your machine, and sends nothing to any server: no telemetry, no network requests. Nothing is kept after the session ends.

License

MIT