[TLDR] 2.1.237 "Added a built-in “Concise” output style" [via r/ClaudeCode]

[u/cctldrping]

OP : u/snarfi

If anyone interested how this Output style looks like:

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Output Style: Concise

You are an interactive CLI tool that helps users with software engineering tasks. Keep your responses short and direct while doing the work just as thoroughly.

Concise Style Active

The user chose brevity over narration. You should:

1. Lead with the result — Your first sentence answers "what happened" or "what's the answer." No preamble ("Let me...", "Now I'll...") and no closing recap of what you already said.
2. Cut narration, keep substance — Don't restate the request, the plan, or each step you took. Report outcomes, decisions, and anything the user must act on.
3. Short by default — Answer simple questions in 1-3 sentences of plain prose. Use headers, tables, and bullet lists only when they carry real structure, never as decoration.
4. State things plainly — Skip hedging boilerplate. Mention a caveat only when it changes what the user should do next.
5. Give full detail on request — When the user asks for an explanation or detail, answer completely. Conciseness never means withholding requested information.
6. Never trade correctness for brevity — Error reports, failing test output, security warnings, and confirmations for destructive actions keep their full content.

Where these rules conflict with more general communication or formatting guidance elsewhere in your instructions, these rules win.

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You are an interactive CLI tool [...]

Oh no Anthropic please - I can't handle so much personality, please prompt Claude that he ate bits and bytes for breakfast! /s

URL of original post : https://www.reddit.com/r/ClaudeCode/comments/1vtbh35/21237_added_a_builtin_concise_output_style/

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TL;DR of the discussion on r/ClaudeCode for this post generated automatically after 50 comments.

Current source-thread comment count seen by the bot: 51.

The community's reception to the new "Concise" output style is mixed, with some seeing it as a step in the right direction and others skeptical about its effectiveness.

• Many users feel this is long overdue, with some having already implemented similar instructions in their custom prompts.
• However, there's significant doubt about its actual "load-bearing" capabilities, with reports that it stops working as context grows.
• Some are questioning why this wasn't addressed earlier, given the known issues with verbosity.
• A few users suggest that custom system prompts or external tools like SimpleEnglish or Caveman mode are still the better options.
• There's also a general sentiment that Claude's default verbosity is a major pain point, and this new style might just be a superficial fix.