Compress Your Claude.md: Cut 60-70% of System Prompt Bloat in Claude Code

Re:Compress Your Claude.md: Cut 60-70% of System Prompt Bloa... by F7F7F7 on Tuesday February 24, 2026 @10:15PM (#47146844)

I've found that maintaining minimal structural cues (typically a single repeating heading) in Claude.md helps it better index information. And anecdotally a lot less GREP'ing, web searching and wasted tokens.

I also include a short instruction a the top of my file. Requiring context to be written as single line rationales with up to 1 additional line for links/refs/pointers. While explicitly forbidding "tutorial-like" explanations and blocks/pages of code.

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Re:Compress Your Claude.md: Cut 60-70% of System Prompt Bloa... by jchilcher on Wednesday February 25, 2026 @11:50AM (#47154087)

The single repeating heading as an index anchor is a smart middle ground — keeps structure without the full markdown overhead. The "single line rationale, no tutorial explanations" constraint is interesting, that's essentially forcing the same signal-over-noise discipline at the instruction level rather than just the formatting level. I might steal that.

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